Leo counted his blessings – most of which were laid out before him. First and foremost was a pocketknife; a small flip-blade with an inch long blade which would be his most important possession in the coming days. Second was the plastic water bottle he had; it would be good to have a container like that, be it for water or something else. Third was his backpack; the heavy duty green canvas was waterproofed, and, in a pinch, he could dissect it to use as bandages or the like. Fourth was the small pack of matches he had apparently left buried in the deepest depths of his pack and only found now, when he dumped most everything else out. Everything else in there was trash – some college papers, folders, the like. They could be used for kindling but wouldn't do much else in his current predicament. That wasn't to say his blessings ended there, however. His fifth and sixth blessings weren't physical objects.
Fifth was his location. Tall pine trees rose around him and mountains loomed on either side of the green valley he sat in the middle of, a river gently flowing off to his right. Leo sucked in a deep breath, appreciating the scent of pine, and listened to the wind as it rustled the trees. He was a mountain boy through and through. And though his wilderness survival skills may be a little rusty thanks to college and work taking up most of his time in the past few years, he was certain that he could at least survive here. It'd take a little bit of work, some trial and error to get his skills back up to snuff, but it was certainly doable. Which led him to his sixth blessing, which also doubled as a problem. He was not alone.
At least, I wasn't alone, Leo thought acidly. It had been a rollercoaster of a day. First, he got magically transported to a swirling tunnel of void and stars thanks to a literal hole in the sky, which had been utterly terrifying but at least he had company. His good friend Jack had been transported with him, and while it wasn't ideal in any way, Leo was glad for the company. It would keep him from losing his mind, at least, as they floated through a literal void of space, somehow without dying. That was until a massive bat made of sky and stars came out of literally nowhere, snatched the two up, and flew through yet another hole in the sky. To top it off the bat was sentient and spoke to Leo telepathically, which wasn't strange at all and totally didn't freak Leo out, having another voice in his head, and had promised to take the two to where they were meant to be.
Apparently that meant dumping Leo in the middle of a forest, and whisking Jack off to who-knows-where. Which led him to his next problem; he wasn't on Earth anymore. Taking a deep breath Leo closed his eyes, then looked up and glared at the pink face that stared at him.
"Sloooow?" It asked, cocking its head to the side, blank eyes staring directly at him. Leo frowned even harder. Slowpoke. The bat – who he figured had to be Lunala, there was nothing else that fit the description – had dropped him into the middle of a slowpoke herd. He was surrounded by the things, dozens of pink blobs of fat lounging around the river, dipping their tails in the water and occasionally swishing them side to side. He even spotted a few slowbro slowly swimming about in the placid waters, their splashes adding to the peaceful ambiance of the forest.
Leo was sure there was some sort of implied insult here, what with the whole where you're meant to be line.
So his biggest problem wasn't that he was alone in a forest with no idea of his general location or the location of any sort of civilization, but that he was in a completely foreign world; the world of pokemon. Oh sure, he knew enough about pokémon as a long-time fan, but there was a truly massive difference between game mechanics and reality. How did attacks work? How did pokémon behave? Were they as intelligent as portrayed in the anime, or were they closer to the animals back home? There was very little he knew and only so much he could figure out without simply experiencing it firsthand. Which could be mighty dangerous.
And to top it all off Leo was far, far shorter now. Everything just seemed bigger, and he had a sneaking suspicion that it wasn't because everything was bigger in this world. He was almost certain that it was because he had gotten shorter – his hands looked smaller and softer too, the hands of a child – which, if he'd read enough fanfiction to come up with an idea of what that meant, was not good news. Either he had regressed in age, or had a new body, both of which came with a whole slew of existential/philosophical issues that he, quite frankly, did not have the luxury to worry about right now. His first order of business was just to survive.
"Ok, my first order of business is fresh water," Leo muttered to himself, standing and looking towards the river. Another problem was that he had no way to boil water, ensuring it was safe to drink. He supposed he could try his luck with the river water, figuring that it most likely didn't have the problems many of Earth's rivers had with pollution, but did he really want to risk getting giardia? He wasn't sure he had much of a choice. Leo swallowed heavily at the thought of getting sick out here. It would be a death sentence, so long as he didn't have a proper food and water supply and –
"NO," Leo chided himself, shaking his head to clear it of all thoughts. "Don't think like that, it'll do you no good. You can't control what's going to happen, so roll with it. Focus on the next steps; food and shelter." His nervousness did not leave despite his pep talk, the emotion bubbling in his stomach even as he tried to ignore it, but now he was refocused.
Moving with purpose, Leo bent and stuffed all his things into his backpack before standing and stretching, slinging said backpack over his shoulders. Glancing around, he made a note of his location relative to the two mountains the river wound between, picking out key features so he could make his way back to the slowpoke herd. It would be pretty simple, all told. The valley wasn't that wide, and the mountains fairly steep – Leo wouldn't be climbing up them in the near future. Besides, if nothing else, he understood that the slowpoke were docile and, if his hunch was correct, they may be able to provide him with some food. Slowpoke tails were edible, right? He remembered that from the games, even if it had been frowned upon. At least, that's what the games led you to believe when Team Rocket was hunting slowpoke tails.
And so, he started off marching into the woods confidently and cautiously, trying his hardest to keep his wits about him. He would survive this, no matter how insane the situation was. He just had to take things one step at a time.
Leo figured out pretty quickly that sticking next to the slowpoke herd as they headed downstream was a great idea. Mainly because they provided a steady source of food in the form of fish – mainly magikarp and goldeen of varying sizes. For whatever reason the fish seemed to flock to their tails whenever the slowpoke would dip them in the river, biting the tips and allowing the slowpoke to fish them up with relative ease. It was easy enough to snatch a few of the fish away from the slow pokemon, the harder part was cooking them.
"C'mon, work already," he hissed in frustration, rubbing his hands together as fast as he could, trying his hardest to get the stick he was holding to create enough friction to create sparks and ignite his kindling. It had already been three days since he'd been dumped into this world, and Leo was getting frustrated. He didn't have the strength anymore to reliably use the hand drill method, and he'd never really practiced it too much in the first place. His matches weren't unlimited, he had at most twenty of the things left, so before he ran out he wanted to have an alternative method of starting a fire, which had led to his current activity.
"I miss my survival kit," Leo grumbled, setting down the stick and rubbing his face. He'd had at least five different ways to start a fire in his survival kit back home, plus a whole bunch of other necessities, and just thinking about having that kit right now made him…well, he wasn't sure how he felt. Nostalgic? Sentimental? Like he wanted to cry because he had left his entire world behind? Like death was a very real possibility right now? All of the above and more, most likely.
A cool wind blew through the tall pines, whistling through the valley floor and making Leo shiver, his hair standing on end and goosebumps crawling up his arms. The small copse of trees he had chosen to take shelter in blocked the most of the wind, but nights up here got real cold real quick, and, if the brilliant orange in the sky and how the sun had already hidden itself behind the mountains were anything to go by, night was coming soon. Leo shuddered and glanced at the magikarp off to his left, sighing. He'd told himself that if he didn't get a fire started with the hand drill, he wouldn't eat fish tonight, even if the fish was far smaller than the anime and games had portrayed. The red, crowned fish was maybe the size of a trout, six to eight inches long, but he supposed that made sense. There was no way a river a foot deep could support entire schools of massive magikarp. So, with a heavy heart, Leo picked up the fish, stood, and tossed it as hard as he could, barely getting it into the river a dozen or so feet away.
"Stupid kid arms," Leo grumbled, lamenting not for the first time his sudden lack of strength. He was pretty sure that was the reason he couldn't get the hand drill to work, the strength in his arms weren't letting him get enough friction. But that could also just be an excuse.
With a sigh, Leo pushed his makeshift fire starter to the side – maybe he made it wrong, that could be the problem – and looked out over the slowpoke herd. His hand absently reached to the side, picking at the pile of pine nuts he had set on a small rock to his right. They were tiny things, almost inedible and definitely out of season, but pinecones were plentiful, and calories were calories. He had to keep his strength up, even if he was punishing himself for failure. Plus, he'd eaten a ton of magikarp and goldeen over the past few days, that was part of the reason he felt comfortable forgoing a meal.
The slowpoke herd, on the other hand, felt no qualms about skimping on meals. Leo watched as a slowbro that had been slowly ambling through the shallow waters of the river moved over to pick up Leo's discarded fish and swallowed it in one gulp. The massive creature was at least five feet tall, and it fixated its dopey eyes on Leo for a brief moment before turning and wading back into the river. It was the biggest one of the herd, the other slowbro being a mere four feet tall and the slowpoke ranging between standing at two to three feet, and Leo had taken to calling him Derp. Not the most flattering of names, but that was all Leo could use to describe the big, dopey creature. It just didn't seem to be altogether there.
"Slooooow," it called, pushing on down the river, prompting similar calls from the rest of the herd. Leo counted exactly twenty three slowpoke and two slowbro in the herd, and they were, for the most part, pleasant company. Yes, they were slow moving, only covering a couple miles in a day as they migrated downriver, and they reminded him of cows in a way, but they didn't even seem to register his presence either. He could walk among them without earning their ire, though a few did watch him warily the first few times he'd stolen their fish.
It was also kind of fun to observe their habits. Most slowpoke didn't really seem to care where they slept during the day, so long as it was in the sun, but at night they took their time picking out the softest parts of the riverbank. Whether that entailed digging into the silt and soil, or stamping down grass to make a bed of sorts, they spent at least an hour every night just settling down. They even got in arguments over who got the best spot sometimes, that was what caused the first pokémon battle Leo had ever seen in this world. All it consisted of was two short water guns, one which missed and the second hitting the other slowpoke in the face, but still! It was amazing to see water shoot out of a slowpoke's mouth at great speed.
Still, it did remind him that slowpoke were pokemon, and had abilities. They were potentially dangerous and, if his memory serves him correctly, part psychic type. Whatever that entailed or how it worked, he didn't know, but it wasn't like he could worry too much about it either. The slowpoke were his food source and, thankfully, the river had clean water. It wasn't like he could just skedaddle on out of the mountains when he had no idea where to go, or what might be or not be food. He needed to secure his future first, then he could explore.
Another cold breeze broke Leo out of his musings, and he shivered, deciding it was time for bed. He'd forgo a fire tonight, since he couldn't get it started the primitive way, and instead turned to the pile of pine needles, leaves, and the one fairly big and bushy pine bough he had picked up off of a fallen tree. That was his bed for the night, and though it was by no means comfortable – Leo would have to resituate himself several times throughout the night – it would keep him warm even without a fire.
Thankfully he still had his backpack to use as a pillow.
"Goodnight, slowpoke," Leo whispered, sliding into his pile and struggling to not itch himself as the pine needles poked through his clothes. The slowpoke did not reply, and Leo watch the sky fade from orange to grey to black, a brilliant sky of stars coming into being through the treetops, as he lay there trying to sleep.
It was going to be a long, restless night.
Leo muttered to himself as he shifted through the pile of shale, tossing the flat rocks to the side as he searched through them. It had been a solid week since his arrival in this valley, and the slowpoke were slow movers. They had travelled maybe ten miles in the past four days, which at least did allow Leo enough time to practice his survival skills and try to get them back up to snuff.
He still hadn't gotten the hand drill fire starting method down, so now he was searching for another solution; flint. His knife – which had been invaluable over the past few days, and he needed to find a good whetstone for it to keep it sharp – was made of carbon steel, which would work well to create sparks if he could find a good rock to bash against it. Heck, he was pretty sure he didn't even need flint, just something hard and with an edge to strike against the back of his knife.
"You'd think I'd be able to find something in this big old pile of rocks, but no," Leo grumbled, halting his search to look around. The pile was at least a hundred feet tall and twenty five feet across, and consisted largely of squared, black stones. "These rocks are all useless,"
To prove his point, Leo struck the back of his knife against one of the rocks, chipping off a piece of stone the rock and producing no sparks, nearly losing his grip on his knife in the process. With a sigh Leo shoved his knife back in his pocket and began shifting through the stones once more.
That is, until one of the rocks he grabbed began to move.
"What in the – " Was all the managed to get out when the head-sized rock opened its eyes and glared at him. Shale flew as the geodude burst forth from its hiding spot, one fist barreling forward and planting itself directly into Leo's chest.
His breath left him with a whoosh and, briefly, Leo found himself falling through the air. Then he was tumbling head over heels down the mountainside, slamming into rocks. Pain rocketed through him as stone dug into his skin, and suddenly he was lying flat on his back, staring up at the cloudless blue sky with grass beneath him.
Leo groaned, trying to ignore the pain all over as he craned his head to look back at the shale pile. He could still see the geodude, clambering its way up the mountain as it fled. It would have looked funny to see a ball of rock powering it's way up a mountain on two oversized arms, were it not for the pain he was in. Though he should probably consider it a small blessing that it didn't chase after him.
"Ugly, goofy little creature," Leo grumbled as he slowly sat up, checking to see if anything was broken. Thankfully it didn't seem like it, but he was sure to be sore and bruised, and he was certainly bleeding. So Leo sat there for a few minutes, catching his breath and calming his nerves as he stared at the shale pile. He needed another way to create fire, other than matches. Flint and steel would be easier than the hand drill method, too. And, now that he thought about it, he may be able to find a rock that might serve as a platter for cooking so he wasn't roasting whole fish on a stick like you'd see in a cartoon, or even one that could be turned into bowl of sorts. He had to keep looking.
But first he was just going to sit here and hurt.
The pidgey cooed, and Leo, laying flat on his belly watching the bird hop across the ground in search of seeds or bugs, cooed back. This pidgey had been hanging around him for the past few hours, noticable by the almost reddish tint to its feathers that other pidgey lacked, and Leo had decided now was a good time to bird watch, and perhaps make friends. The pidgey seemed indifferent to his calls for the most part though.
Sighing, Leo sat up, wincing slightly as his back twinged in pain from his fall with the geodude a day ago. He hadn't even found any flint, either. Thankfully the slowpoke were still fishing their hearts out, providing Leo with enough easy food. He honestly didn't know what he'd do without them.
Though speaking of food, Leo eyed the grasshoppers that buzzed and flew through the air every time the pidgey got too close. It had been a bit of a discovery for Leo to realize this world had actual bugs like Earth, not just bug pokemon. The small, normal-sized and shaped bugs were a staple food source for many critters, and important for the ecosystem. Pokemon were just…too big to fill that role, Leo figured.
Ever so slowly, Leo reached out and snagged one of the locusts that had been lounging on a grass stalk just in front of him. It was…time for lunch, and Leo figured he should at least try to eat the bug. He'd heard somewhere that grasshoppers were excellent sources of calories.
"Through the lips, over the gums, look out stomach – you're not gonna like this," Leo whispered, trying his hardest to ignore the buzzing in his hand as he, in one swift motion, popped the grasshopper in his mouth, bit once filling his mouth with disgusting bug juices, and swallowed. This was immediately followed by gagging and retching that echoed throughout the meadow, startling the pidgey and causing it to shoot off into the air with an annoyed squawk and the flapping of wings.
"That was vile," Leo hissed through his teeth, holding the back of his hand to his mouth and fighting back the urge to vomit. "I'll probably just stick with ants. At least they just taste like salt," this was a fact Leo could attest to, as he had eaten quite a few ants when he was a kid. His brother had dared him to, so he did, and lo and behold he liked the taste.
"I want a hamburger. And chicken, or fruit," Leo said wistfully. His diet almost exclusively consisted of nuts and fish, neither of which were seasoned and thus, bland. Plus he had to go through a lot of work just to get a few pine nuts. It made him really appreciate the ease of access for food in his previous world, which brought him around to thinking about proper nutrition. Leo did have a few concerns about the variety of his diet and whether he was getting all the proper nutrients, but again, there was little he could do. Maybe if he understood what plants were edible or not he could do something about it, but he didn't, so the point was moot.
Glancing at the sky next, Leo frowned. The temperature was already starting to drop despite it being midday, and on the horizon sat ominous grey clouds. A storm was coming and he didn't really have any real shelter from it. There weren't any convenient caves nearby, no rocks to hide under, and his trick with the pine needles to keep warm wouldn't really help with staying dry. Leo rubbed his chin, trying to think of something that might help…
The meadow in front of him was useless, and the tall pines weren't really helpful either. Further down the river was a bunch of willow-like bushes, dense green things with heavy, almost minty-smelling leaves that could probably provide some cover, but he wasn't sure he wanted to crawl in there after watching an spinarak scuttle its way in the bushes earlier. Leo shuddered just thinking of the massive green spider. He may have gotten over his fear of spiders years ago, but that didn't mean he liked the horrific creatures. Much less one that was a foot in diameter.
I wonder how spinarak tastes…Leo thought randomly before shaking that image out of his head. He had almost imagined the spinarak like a land crab, and though he'd heard of people eating the massive bird-eating spider in his old world, he wasn't quite desperate enough to follow suit quite yet. No, his top priority was to find shelter from the storm, and, as he tended to do now, he turned to the slowpoke for help.
On the other side of the river bank was the slowpoke herd, having crossed over sometime the previous night, and were hanging out next to a rocky outcropping, sunning themselves on the rocks and lounging in the shallow waters. The rocks could be an option, but that would mean crossing the river. The murky waters didn't look dangerous, and the current wasn't fast, but Leo wanted to avoid that if at all possible. He didn't know why, really, he just didn't want to cross the river. Besides, the rocks wouldn't keep him dry, they'd just shelter him a bit from the wind – thus, useless.
"Slooow," one of the slowpoke called, yawning immediately after. The rest of the herd yawned as well, almost like it was choreographed. Leo bit back his own yawn, the effort making his eyes tear up.
"Right, let's go take a look around, see what I can find," Leo said, standing up slowly and gingerly. His knee popped painfully as he stood, and he grimaced. "Should be fun," he told himself through gritted teeth, and moved off into the forest.
After about an hour and a half of searching, during which time he ran across a colony of oddish led by a foul-smelling gloom that had eyed him warily, Leo stumbled across a god-send. A copse of trees at the base of the mountain, about a mile from where Leo had last seen the slowpoke herd, stood tall and dense, but most importantly, they were of a different species of tree than Leo had seen around. Aspens and tall pine were common, but the grove consisted mostly of a blue-spruce lookalike with big bushy branches that bent and touched the ground, completely covering the base of the trunk. And when Leo pushed aside the branches it revealed a completely covered area free of tree branches that Leo could easily lay underneath and ideally stay dry.
"Finally, some more good luck," Leo breathed in relief, smiling to himself. He hadn't found a good stone to help him start fires yet, nor was the hand drill method working, so he was glad something else had gone right. Plus this grove consisted almost entirely of these same trees! So if he got bored of the first tree, then he could move!
It was a good thing he found the trees, too, because not an hour later, while he was busy trying to find a good whetstone for his knife along the river, it started to rain.
Leo pocketed the smooth river stone he had been examining, squinting up at the sky as it began to drizzle. He could still see sunny skies to his left, in the direction the storm was heading, but to his right was nothing but increasingly dark storm clouds and the rumbling of thunder. Leo sucked in a deep breath, enjoying the scent of rain and letting the misty droplets slick his hair.
"Gotta love a good storm," he said, trying to remain upbeat as he headed back to his tree, sliding underneath the branches and laying still, pleased to see he was right, and that he was being kept dry for now. He'd have to see if that stayed true if the rain picked up, but for now he remained hopeful.
After a few moments of watching the rain through the branches, Leo pulled out his knife, flipped it open, and pulled out the stone he had grabbed. He didn't know if it was the right coarseness to get the best edge, but the blade was dull enough as it was, so anything would help. The sound of metal scraping against stone filled Leo's ears for the better part of an hour, at the end of which his knife was a fair bit sharper than it had been.
Left with not much else to do as the temperature continued to drop and the rain picked up, Leo pulled a few of the branches aside to watch the rain.
Most critters seemed to have the same idea as Leo and were hiding, but some had different plans. Five wooper came waltzing out of the river, shaking their little blue bodies in the rain and happily skipping about, shooting jets of water and globs of mud at each other as they played. Lei chuckled quietly as he watched their antics. They traipsed about for a while, whooping and playing and shuffling in the mud. Leo noticed one digging up plants and chewing on something just a little ways away from the river, which he made a mental note to check out when it stopped raining. But they didn't stay out for long, and vanished back into the river just as quickly as they had come.
Then another brilliant idea he should've thought if earlier flashed into Leo's mind and, shuffling through his backpack, which he had stowed beneath the tree before the rain hit, he procured his water bottles, filled with murky river water as they were. Leo promptly dumped those out and placed them beneath streams of rainwater pouring from the tree he lay under to fill up. There, he thought with a small smile, laying down. Now I have something to drink besides river water.
The rain lasted for a solid sixteen hours. Leo wasn't actually sure how long it rained, he was more of guessing based on how the rain started around mid afternoon, and ended mid morning the next day. Which sucked because now Leo was cold and stiff from laying beneath a tree for that long, unable to really cover himself at all and the tree cover only providing the bare minimum of support. And now he was hungry, so as he slid out of the tree cover, the wet soil clinging to his hands and knees and squelching beneath his feet, he made immediate plans to procure food.
Steam rolled off the ground as the early morning sun warmed it, setting the world into a picturesque moment that Leo had to stop and admire. The morning sun filtered through the trees in individual rays, and the pine needles glistened with water. Leo groaned and stretched, his knees and back popping loudly. The cold clung to his body bone-deep, and he wiggled his fingers in an attempt to bring life back into them. He stamped his feet and started moving, heading towards the slowpoke herd, and jumping up and down to get his blood pumping, trying to alleviate at least some of the chill. So fixated on the cold he was, he almost didn't notice the churned soil where the wooper had been digging the previous day.
Leo hesitated for a moment, debating coming back later to investigate. No, he thought to himself. I should take a look now, before I forget. So he bent over, searching around for what the wooper had dug up.
It took a good few minutes for Leo to find anything, most of the evidence having been washed away by the rain save for the holes in the ground the wooper had left, and what he did find filled him with hope. A plant had been dug up, with broad, dark green leaves and a large, round root that had chunks torn out of it. It looked an awful lot like a tuber – a wild potato maybe? Leo searched for more, the distinct leaves proving easy to find. He dug one up with enthusiasm, his hands clawing at the soft soil, until it revealed to him its prize – an unblemished, albeit dirt covered, root that fit snugly into the palm of his hand. It was maybe three inches long, and an inch around.
Looking at it, Leo could see the resemblance to a potato, and when he broke it open with a wet snap to taste it, his suspicions were confirmed. The pale white meat of the tuber tasted like a bitter potato, and Leo laughed aloud. Here he was, surrounded by vegetables, and he didn't even know it.
Still, he couldn't help but grin wildly. As terrible as the situation was currently, Leo could survive.
"No, not just survive," Leo told himself, digging up more of the pseudo potato plants for breakfast. "These mountains can provide everything I need to thrive."
2
Rock clashed against metal and sparks flew, landing in the loosely packed pile of dead grass and pine needles. Smoke began to rise from the set of kindling and Leo scrambled forward onto his hands and knees, his knife and the stone he had been using tossed to the side as he leaned down to gently blow on the budding fire, coaxing the sparks to bloom into a full-blown flame. Soon enough flames started to catch on the tee-pee style formation of twigs settled around the kindling, and Leo began to add bigger sticks to it, feeding the fire but trying not to smother it with too much fuel. It took maybe two minutes for Leo to be satisfied that his fire wouldn't die, and he laughed at the sight of the small, merry flame slowly growing in size before him.
"What do you think of that, huh?" Leo boasted smugly to the slowpoke not but three feet to his right, its blank eyes staring at the flames.
"Sloooow?" It called, tilting its head to the side, tail slowly wagging back and forth.
"Finally, I have successfully found a replacement for matches – though I should probably still figure out the hand drill method, don't you think?" Leo asked, crossing his arms and sitting back, content to just watch for now.
The slowpoke made a strange noise in the back of its throat and, with a slow, almost methodical movement, opened its mouth to shoot a jet of water at the flame, successfully dousing it and the pile of sticks Leo had collected behind it. Leo's jaw dropped, the remains of his creation now just a pile of blackened twigs and smoke. His first successful fire without using matches, and a stupid slowpoke destroyed it.
"Slooow," the slowpoke said, and Leo could almost see the smug gleam in its eyes as it turned to look at him.
"You little jerk," Leo hissed, resisting the urge to shove the slowpoke away. With slow, methodical movements the slowpoke turned around and ambled back to its herd, greeting its fellow slowpoke with low calls and the occasional nudge. Leo just glared as it left, uncaring about how upset Leo was with it.
He couldn't stay mad though, and slumped forward. At least he knew he could start a fire now, and he hadn't really needed it at the moment. Still, it would have been nice to revel in his victory for a few more moments before the slowpoke put out the fire.
Stretching and standing, Leo turned his attention to the slowpoke herd. They had led him to a big lake, he estimated it was probably at least a mile long at its widest, though the slowpoke had congregated where the river flowed into the lake. The slowbro swam lazily through the waters, occasionally diving beneath the surface, while the slowpoke lounged on the shores, tails dangling in the waters. Three butterfree danced in the air above the lake, glittering scales falling from their wings to land on the surface of the water, which was set to gleaming by the mid-morning sun. To the right side of the lake dense trees grew, following up the entirety of the mountain. More mountains rose in front and to the left of the lake, great behemoths of rock and stone that held untold secrets – or so Leo liked to romanticize it.
"What a beautiful day though, isn't it?" Leo murmured. And truly it was. The air was crisp and cool, the slight breeze rustled the trees, and the buzzing of insects coupled with the occasional cry of a pokémon created a symphony that flowed through Leo's body and touched his very soul.
There could be a lot to complain about his situation, that is true, but Leo would be lying if he said he wasn't having fun. Adventure hadn't been laid at his feet, he had been submerged fully into it – there was no escaping it even if he wanted to, not that he did. He just had to force himself not to think about all that he left behind, all he had left undone. Which at the moment, was hard to do.
Leo let out a breath and looked at the sky, a singular bird pokémon flying high above.
"For of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: It might have been!" he recited slowly, drawing upon his memories of a poem he had read long ago written by one John Greenleaf Whittier. Leo had enjoyed poetry to some degree, but never really got too into it. There had always been other things to do, but the quote here had always stuck out to him and was just a bit too relevant.
He didn't want to think that he had been given another chance in this…new life, for that is all Leo could really think to call it, because that would be something along the lines of admitting defeat. He had been young, he had found a purpose, and now, all he could dream about his old life was what might have been. He might have been great, or good, or…any number of things. Now he was here, in this world, with no explanation as to why. It had better be a good reason, Leo thought, a bubble of anger worming its way into his stomach.
"But there's no point in dwelling on 'might have beens.' You've still got things to do Leo," he told himself, tamping down his anger and pushing away his thoughts. "You've got an alternative fire method down, and you still need to figure out the hand drill method, but right now you need to secure another supply of meat besides mooching off of the slowpoke. So let's start with tracking, and figuring out traps," he muttered, rubbing his face.
Sure, he could gather edible plants for food, but he had been considering another problem – clothing. He had no idea what time of year it was, and this high in the mountains things were sure to get cold in the winter. Leo was not dressed for winter. All he had was his black, Billy Joel concert t-shirt and plain jeans, which spelled almost certain death during the first snow. So he wanted to find and hunt a furry pokémon that he could potentially tan and turn into a coat or something. Tanning leather was another problem though, but one he'd have to figure out once he got around to successfully hunting things.
"It's a good thing I'm a master of camouflage," Leo joked with a laugh, stripping completely nude and traipsing towards the lake. First he was going to "camouflage" himself, then he would go start tracking and trying to sneak up on things. He'd seen a few sentret and rattata around, they should make good practice targets. A wide grin spread across Leo's face as his toes sunk into the mud of the shore. "Who am I kidding? This is just an excuse to play in the mud," he declared proudly, and promptly fell flat on his face to roll about on the muddy shoreline.
He slathered and splashed mud all over himself, sticking blades of grass and twigs into the larger clumps that stuck to him more for his amusement than for any form of camouflage. A part of him wondered how well this would work, another didn't really care. Though that internal debate was settled mostly by the sudden appearance of a slowpoke, dropping itself onto the ground next to him and thrashing about, covering its pink hide with mud.
It stopped after a brief second and stared blankly at Leo, cocking its head to the side with a smear of dark brown mud on top of its head.
"Slooow?" it called, and Leo laughed.
He laughed hard and long, especially when more slowpoke came to join him in rolling in the mud, a curious display, he was sure. He could only imagine how it would look to any passersby to see a naked boy slathering himself with mud while slowpoke rolled all around him. And that thought was nothing short of hilarious, so Leo laughed deeply and fully for the first time since he had arrived here.
Leo crouched low to the ground, a hefty stick held loosely in one hand, and his prey in sight. He crept forward, careful not to step on any breakable twigs, and trying not to rustle the dead grass around him too much. It wasn't very tall, maybe ankle height brown and green grass, but it did make a lot of noise if brushed against. And unfortunately, the rattata he was stalking seemed to have sensed something was up.
The purple rat paused in its scrabbling in the dirt to sniff the air and Leo froze, casting his eyes downward ever so slightly because the face was the most easily recognizable part of the body. Sweat beaded on Leo's forehead as he waited, stock still in an awkward position with the sun beating down on him from above. After a second of holding his breath Leo looked up, adrenaline surging through his veins when he saw that the rattata had turned its back to him – and it was in range. Carefully Leo pulled back his arm, fingers clenching around the smooth grooves he had carved into the stick.
His heart hammered in his ears, his blood roared, and his muscles surged as he hurled his stick towards his prey. The stick arced, spinning beautifully through the air at the unmoving rattata only to sail right over its head and clatter against the ground, startling the rattata so much it shot a foot in the air and scrambled off into the brush and safety. Leo slumped in defeat, standing up and cursing at his aim. He was so close too. And at least his stalking skills were better than his tracking and trapping skills were. Those were…abysmal, to say the least. His tracking could be remedied with practice, but he wasn't seeing much hope for trapping at the moment.
"Not that I ever got much practice with traps," Leo grumbled to himself, striding over to his designated throwing stick. The occasional sharp rock or thorn poked into the bare soles of his feet, but Leo persevered. He wanted to toughen his feet up, in case he lost his shoes. That, and really, being naked and covered in mud wasn't really the same if he was wearing shoes. If he was going to play the part of the savage wild-man, he might as well really look the part, right?
Angry chittering drew Leo's attention, his gaze falling upon the rattata he had missed. It crouched not far in the budding brush to Leo's right, its fur blending in rather well with the shadows and densely packed branches, its overlarge teeth gnashing at Leo angrily. Leo narrowed his eyes at the creature. Did it really want to play that game? Fine. He'd play that game.
Leo dropped his stick and picked up a hefty rock, hurling it at the rattata and missing it by inches, mostly because it dodged out of the way and continued to chitter at him, pacing back and forth.
"You little – you're taunting me, aren't you?" Leo demanded, picking up his stick. "Fine, let's go buddy boy," he said, advancing towards the brush. The rattata retreated further into the bush, but still chittered at Leo. For a brief moment, Leo considered pushing into the brush. It was taller than he was, with dense, albeit thin branches that would poke and prod him to no end. It would be difficult, but was getting the rattata worth it…? He poked experimentally at the bush, pressing against it and testing its resistance.
With blinding speed the rattata darted forward, white light sparking off its little rat paws. Leo yelped and jumped backwards in surprise, his quick reaction the only thing that saved him from the loud snap! Of the rattata's jaws slamming shut where his feet had been but moments before. Leo's eyes widened and he hyper-focused, all thought fleeing his mind in lieu of one reaction – fight.
"Yaaaah!" Leo cried, kicking at the rattata, who scrambled away and back into the bush, still chattering angrily. Leo scowled at it and backpedaled away, locking himself into a stare down with the little creature. The rat gnashed its teeth one more time, its curled tail waving back and forth, and Leo decided then and there that it wasn't worth it to continue this fight. He sighed and turned away, trudging back to his temporary home next to the lake, glancing down at his throwing stick. He needed a better hunting method if traps were out, and his aim sucked. It would be great if he could make a bow, but he had no idea where to even start there…But, Leo thought, looking down at his stick as he sorted through his memories. I might be able to get the next best thing. All I need is to figure out how to make cordage.
It took Leo three days to finally figure out the proper method of making cord or rope from plant fibers, and even then it wasn't perfect. Dead grasses seemed to work the best for his purposes, but he still thought he was missing a step or two somewhere – he was thinking he might have to figure out how to separate the fibers themselves from the plants. How he would go about this he didn't exactly know, but that was a step for another day. Mainly because he had found a way to circumvent the need for cordage for the moment, a rather simple solution that had him feeling a little stupid. But for now he had a working prototype weapon to test out.
Leo gripped the short, stiff length of wood with one hand, his index finger stretching up to hold a longer, more flexible length against a sharpened nub on the end of the short branch. The longer piece of wood he had sharpened to a fine point and hardened in the fire, and was aimed into the wide open meadow Leo currently stood on the edge of.
"Atlatl test one, let's see how this thing works," Leo said to no one in particular. He did a little hop-skip step and threw his arm forward like he was throwing a baseball, flicking the shorter length of wood as hard as he could, and sending his thin, impromptu "spear" through the air. Leo whistled as he watched it fly, going at least fifty feet before embedding itself in the ground. He glanced appreciatively at the base of his weapon, weighing it in one hand. "That went better than expected. I've got distance, now I just need to focus on how much power I'm getting, and my accuracy,"
That, however, would just take practice. And, the way Leo saw it, he would be getting a lot of practice. Mostly because he was dumb, and hadn't realized what time of year it was when it was quite literally staring him in the face.
He tried hard not to acknowledge the budding flowers his spear – or dart, whatever it was called – had landed next to, pulling the ammunition out of the ground and looking at the sky. The flowers hadn't fully budded yet, not all of them, at least, which meant this was early to late spring. Even the bush that the rattata had hid in wasn't fully bloomed yet, and for that, Leo felt like a right idiot. Here he was feeling all smart and proud for remembering about the atlatl, the ancient precursor to the bow that was stupid easy to make in the wild, and for finding a rock suitable for the flint-and-steel method of fire making, when he couldn't even figure out what time of year it was based on freaking plant growth.
"Well, at least it keeps me humble," Leo told himself, shaking his head and running his hands through his hair. He let out a breath and looked around the meadow, eyes fixating themselves on a small patch of grass that was much shorter than the rest of the knee-high foliage. This meadow was one he frequented because he found out the longer, yellow grasses helped make decent rope, but that one spot always worried him. When he had investigated it a few days prior he had found evidence of ash and soot – which led him to think of a fire-type pokémon. It wasn't uniform enough to be a human's work, and there was no evidence of a camp that he could find, so the only reasonable solution was a fire type.
Which could be both good and bad. Mostly bad though, the majority of fire-type pokémon either seemed to live in volcanoes, or were predatory. Charizard, pyroar, and houndoom all came to mind. Leo shuddered and forced that idea out of his head. He hadn't run into any real predators yet, and he wasn't prepared for an up-close and personal encounter. Leo didn't like his chances of winning a fight against a flying, fire-breathing dragon, or a fire breathing dog.
"Don't get me wrong, it'd be so cool to see one, but let's keep them at a distance for now," Leo said to himself, swinging his atlatl spear, which was about half as tall as he was, around carelessly. A gust of wind roared through the trees, whipping the grasses to the side as the slapped at Leo's bare thigh. Pine needles fell from the trees and waves of green pollen followed suit, filling the air to the point it looked like a fire was raging somewhere. Leo sneezed and rubbed his nose, shielding his face as he looked up at the sky. The sun was really harsh, and all this walking around naked or covered in mud was starting to annoy him. He didn't want to get even more sunburned than he already was.
"Yep, it's time to make a hat," Leo decided. "And to put my clothes back on. Now it's getting a little silly," he said, and laughed to himself, turning on his heel and marching off towards his temporary camp, singing the tune of Joy to the World by Three Dog Night as loudly as he could. Today was a good day.
Leo crouched low in the bushes, eyes fixated on the truly magical sight before him. Two sunflora stood in a large, open meadow on the far end of the lake, surrounded by at least a half dozen bellossom that danced and spun around them, their little flower-petal dresses spinning around as they danced to the mystical music. An odd ringing sound rang through the meadow, accompanied by the soothing, almost flute-like sound of the grass whistles the sunflora were blowing on.
The bellossom laughed and twirled, jumping into the air as they danced about, the tinkling, ringing sounds only seeming to intensify as they did so. Petals floated through the air gaily, spinning and swirling around the musicians and their dancers, intense rays of sunlight beating down on the meadow like a beacon. They danced and swayed and even sang in small, lilting cries that somehow fit together perfectly with the tune, which in turn harmonized with the wind and the rustling of the grass and the groaning of trees. Leo found himself humming along and did nothing to resist the urge, swaying to the tune and drumming the soil with his fingers.
The beat picked up, the whistling of the sunflora sharpened, and the bellossom leapt into the air. Green light sprang forth on the ground, the grass growing visibly healthier and more wild beneath the bellossoms' feet. Then the beat slowed, and the bellossom ceased their erratic jumping, standing in place and swaying side-to-side, the petals that flew through the air slowing to a gentle drifting pattern, swirling around the meadow like a protective veil.
Leo doubted he'd ever forget this sight, and for the next hour that was all he did. Sit in the shadows, and watch the flowers dance.
That night, Leo did something he hadn't thought about doing since he landed here in this world. With his filleted magikarp dinner roasting on a flat rock over the fire, a ring of pine nuts and the potato-esque plants he had found around it as a garnish, Leo pulled out one of the many notebooks he had in his backpack and a mechanical pencil that had been in his pocket, and began to write a poem. It wasn't anything special really, he'd never gotten into poetry writing the way some of his fellow classmates had, mostly because he preferred to write stories over poetry, but he wasn't in the mood to write a story and watching the bellossom today had stirred something within him.
It was a strange, esoteric side of him that looked at the world in a lens of rose color and metaphor – the same one that had taken the bellossom and sunflora dance as a blessing and admired its beauty, but left whatever it might mean metaphorically alone because, quite frankly, to try and capture that sight into words was doing it an injustice.
So Leo wrote and rewrote and stared at the flames of his fire, at the dying light of the sun, and the slowpoke as they settled in to bed – funnily enough, the herd had taken to rolling in the mud just like he had taught them when he tried to camouflage himself. He watched, for a moment, one slowpoke as it wandered through the herd, nudging a fellow herd member every once in a while. Leo took inspiration from these sights and scratched away at the paper, putting his feelings to form.
After a few moments the smell of something burning reached his nose and Leo cursed, setting aside his pencil and scrambling to remove his dinner from the heat. The cooking rock he had used was longer than it was wide and was fairly thin, allowing for it to heat up well. That also meant he had "handles" to grab onto in the form of the excess rock that stuck out over the fire pit he had dug – propped up as it was on a "stand," in the form of two smaller, albeit squarish, rocks.
That didn't mean it wasn't hot though, and Leo cursed as he grabbed the sides, the heat very uncomfortable. The moment he set it down, away from the fire, Leo leapt to his feet and did a dance of pain, hopping about and waving his hands as if to cool them off.
"Ow, ow, ow that's hot," he hissed, clenching and unclenching his fists. Smoke rose from the nuts and potato-things as they lay on the rock, and Leo cursed his short attention span. Couldn't writing have waited until he was done with dinner? Of course not, he had to go and lose focus, and now his dinner was burned. Gingerly, Leo poked at the fish fillet to ensure it was done and, satisfied that it was, he popped a chunk of white fish meat into his mouth.
Unfortunately, the bottom of the fillet was burned. Fortunately, a little bit of burned food never hurt anyone, and though it wasn't a good taste at least it was a different flavor than the rather bland, basic taste of a magikarp fillet. Muttering to himself Leo settled back down, peeling his food off of his impromptu plate and looking back out over at the slowpoke herd. The sun had set by now and the darkness of the night settled, and thanks to the light from the fire Leo's night vision hadn't adjusted yet. But he could still see the lumps that formed the slowpoke herd, and that same slowpoke that had been wandering about earlier, finishing a complete circuit before settling in itself.
Leo hummed and polished off his meal, flipping his cooking rock upside down over the fire to clean off whatever had stuck to it and settling back contentedly against a tree. The small grove he had settled his camp in was enough to keep the wind and rain off, but if the slowpoke decided to stick around this lake for a while then he'd need to find something more permanent.
When his eyelids began to droop and the fire began to die, Leo stood and stretched, determined not to sleep yet. If he fell asleep this early then he'd wake up well before dawn, so, to keep himself awake for a little longer yet Leo headed away from his fire and toward the lake.
Somewhere in the distance a hoothoot hooted (and wasn't that a funny phrase) as Leo came to stop next to the shoreline, hands in the pockets of his jeans, his eyes slowly adjusting to the darkness. The moon was a half-crescent, and the myriad of stars above shone with such brilliance Leo's breath was taken away even after having seen the same sight practically every night since he arrived here. There were so many stars, it made even the mountains of his home seem polluted. It wasn't even hard to pick out the "milky way," or whatever galaxy this was, that stretched as a band of densely gleaming stars in the sky.
The hoothoot hooted again somewhere to Leo's right, followed by a sharp flapping of wings that carried the round-ish bird from the tree it had been in into the sky, visible only as a black blob that quickly vanished. After a few more minutes, life returned to the forest as the nocturnal creatures came fully to life – though it was still far calmer than any point during the day. Leo yawned and shrugged off the melancholy he'd been feeling.
Maybe he would go to bed soon. Staying awake wasn't doing him any good, he was just thinking too much.
"Night, slowpoke," Leo murmured, turning his back to the lake.
A blinding white flash suddenly lit up the night sky, illuminating the forest for miles around. Leo whirled back around as a thunderous roar buffeted him, his eyes catching the last fleeting glimpse of a beam of white light streaking off into the sky. A metallic shriek rang through the air, stilling the forest and sending fearful chills down Leo's spine. He remained perfectly still as he stared in the direction of the flash, the only sound he heard being the hammering of his heart and the swiftness of his breath. Around him the slowpoke stirred, raising their heads to look at the direction of the disturbance. Time stretched on, but no further noise was made, and after fifteen minutes of silence the forest began to move again. Bugs buzzed about, and Leo even spotted a few zubat flying about in the open air, hunting for food.
The slowpoke grunted and laid back down, closing their eyes and falling into a slumber, which prompted Leo to move back over to the embers of his fire and sit down next to his "bed," a pile of leaves and pine needles. He sat there for a long time before he lay down, watching the direction the beam of light had come from. Only one other creature seemed to care about it anymore; a slowpoke, whose head remained raised and looking off into the distance even as its brethren slept.
"You too, huh, buddy?" Leo asked it in a whisper, more talking to himself than the slowpoke. "Looks like I won't be getting much sleep tonight," he murmured, rolling onto his back. He wondered what caused that, and what the shriek was, as he lay there. A small part of him wanted to go check out what it was, to find out what caused all that, while the rest of him screamed danger.
Leo sighed, already knowing which part of himself would win the contest of wills.
"Looks like I'm going tracking tomorrow," he muttered, and closed his eyes.
Leo dusted his fingers along the divot in the ground, eyes easily picking up the features of the track. Whatever had left this was incredibly heavy and large, as the three-toed track sunk deep into the soil. Amazingly though, it doesn't seem to leave much trace on the surroundings, Leo thought, glancing around the forest. True, the trees here weren't very densely packed, and there weren't many bushes or anything for the creature to smash with its feet, but there weren't even any broken branches or gnawed on grass that could suggest what kind of creature left this.
Leo's first thought was a golem – he'd seen the unevolved forms around so he knew graveller and geodude were in the area, but he also wasn't certain that golem could use what he could only assume to be a hyper beam. Maybe an ursaring? He knew what bear tracks looked like, and this wasn't a bear, but then again maybe the pokémon ursaring had different tracks than what Leo was used to seeing from bears. Standing up, Leo grabbed his atlatl and continued forward, the extra darts he had crafted held in his other hand.
He moved as silently as he could, following the clear trail the monster had left in its wake and keeping his eyes and ears open. Most importantly he was listening to the noise of the forest, and the sound of the bugs. Right now flies buzzed, grasshoppers chirped, and the forest was just alive. If all that fell silent, then it meant there was something else in the woods, something dangerous. But things were good now, and Leo could afford to relax a little.
He followed the tracks for at least a mile, long enough for him to begin to doubt that he was, in fact, following the right trail, when he came across the scar of the short battle he had only seen the after effects of. A hole had been blasted through the trees at an upward angle, branches and even entire tree trunks snapped in half from the force of whatever hit it. Leo whistled as he surveyed the damage. The beam hadn't just blown through a few of the trees, it had seemingly evaporated entire chunks of what had been in the way. One tree in particular had an almost perfectly round, semi-circular hole on the side of its trunk. It was a miracle it was even standing upright.
Pausing to examine the tracks, Leo situated himself where he thoughts the creature had positioned itself to fire its attack. Both feet were planted firmly on the ground parallel to each other, evidenced by the divots about three feet apart in the ground, and what Leo could only assume was a tail had slammed against the ground far behind it. A small shrub was even crushed by it.
"What were you shooting at?" Leo murmured, squinting in the direction the beam had been fired. Frowning, Leo moved forward, looking at the sky, the ground, the trees, anything that might give him a hint. It surprisingly didn't take him long, as he spotted what he was looking for as it lay in a bush, shining in the sunlight Leo furrowed his brows in confusion as he knelt and plucked the large, oblong metal…thing, out of the bush.
It was surprisingly light and was patterned much like a feather would be, with a long, thin tube running along the spine of the curved object, providing support. The edges were even fairly thin, and though it had the same sort of multifaceted texture as a normal feather, despite its size, it was solid and made entirely of metal. Realization dawned upon Leo as he hefted the object in one hand, fitting the stalk of it in his palm. This was a feather, a metal feather. Which left two options for what could have left it – either a skarmory or a corviknight, the only two steel and flying type pokémon Leo could remember. But he doubted it was a corviknight, this feather was polished to a high sheen and the edges were sharp – not razor sharp, no, in that respect it was duller than his knife, but it still held a noticeable edge. He was pretty certain corviknight didn't have sharp feathers, and had a darker coloration.
"Then what picked a fight with a skarmory?" Leo mused, swinging the feather experimentally. It was long, at least three feet long and too large for his small body, and had a few dents in it, but it was a solid weapon. He'd find a use for it somehow. He was pretty sure the lore of skarmory indicated their feathers could be used as swords, which Leo could see why, though he wouldn't be using it as such. Unless the wielder was very skilled it wasn't likely a sword would do a lot of good against a powerful wild pokémon.
Leo's immediate instinct was to go back to tracking, but something told him to have a further look around, see if he could find any more feathers. They would be incredibly useful, he was sure, and after a few minutes of searching Leo had found two more feathers. Well, more like a small, palm sized shard of one and a slightly longer, twisted and bent feather. Shoving both of his smaller finds in his backpack, as well as his atlatl, the ends of the darts sticking out of the pack, Leo headed back towards the tracks and continued to follow his prey, toying with his newest find.
He was so distracted by the large feather, in fact, that he almost missed the quieting of the forest before it was too late. Bugs still buzzed in the distance, and pidgey cried somewhere out to his left, but in his immediate vicinity it was dead silent. Leo froze and swiveled his head, adrenaline spiking through his veins as he scaned the trees above and the forest around him. To his left was a large outcropping of rocks, patches of light green moss growing on the white boulders, while to his front and his right the forest grew denstly together and headed downhill – small, shrub-like plants with light yellow leaves covering the ground. Nothing moved and neither did Leo for a moment, when he slowly began to back up, heading the way he came.
A scraping sound to his left, from the direction of the rock outcropping, had Leo freezing in his tracks, eyes widening as he saw the stones move. Boulders that easily weighed more than a few tons were rolled to the side as a tyranitar, in all its glory, revealed itself. It stretched to its full height of over seven feet, craning its neck to look at the sky and unleashing a yawn that revealed four sharp fangs and rows of dull, flat teeth. Yet as Leo stared down its ominously black gullet, he found himself eerily calm. If he did anything rash he could very well earn the creature's ire, so all he could do was stand there, and pray it paid him no mind.
The tyranitar's faded green hide was littered with cracks and scars, tips of the spikes that adorned its spine shattered or broken off completely, while its tail thrashed to and fro, casually sliding the boulders in its way with its immense strength. Leo could not help but admire the beauty of the creature. It did not look young – its hide was far too faded and scarred for what could reasonably be considered young (not that he knew how evolution worked here, this was all conjecture), but its regal might was not to be denied.
Stone ground on stone as the tyranitar shook itself, small pebbles falling from its back and head when, quite suddenly, it finally caught sight of Leo. It didn't make a move, and Leo found time stretching as he and the tyranitar just looked at each other, its large charcoal colored iris just…looking at him. Slowly, Leo laid his skarmory feather on the ground, and held up his hands.
"I mean no harm," he said softly, calmly. The tyranitar regarded him for a moment, then snorted and shook of its entire body again, rock dust flying into the air, before lumbering off up the hill to the left, each footstep thudding against the ground.
Leo didn't move until well after the tyranitar had left and the sounds of the forest returned to the area. In fact, he didn't move at all until his legs involuntarily gave out, and the sudden tenseness of the situation he had just survived washed over him. So that was a tyranitar, a pseudo-legendary. Leo laughed shakily, licking his lips and flopping onto his back, staring at the sky and well aware of the stupid grin on his face. His pack made the action of lying on his back very uncomfortable, but he couldn't find it in him to care.
"I think," Leo muttered, "I'm going to need a change of pants,"
Days blurred into weeks as the slowpoke herd remained by the lake, slowly migrating down its shoreline. With each passing day Leo ventured further and further away from the herd, practicing his skills and exploring the world of pokémon in its rawest form. He had seen quite a bit, from herds of stantler to a lumbering ursaring, to even a stunky as it wandered through a patch of wetlands. But most importantly he had started to climb up and over mountains, exploring more territory on a daily basis.
This led him to his current activity – he was going to explore a cave. The six-foot-tall cave entrance situated at the base of a small, twenty foot tall cliff was a solid half day's worth of travel from the lake, and though Leo didn't know all that much about spelunking, he also wasn't planning on going in too deep. But his curiosity had been peaked, so he had to check it out.
He'd stumbled across the tyranitar tracks a couple days ago – unmistakable as they were – and in a moment of insanity had decided to follow them. They led him to this cave not once, but three separate times as the tyranitar travelled in circles near the entrance. Not once, however, did the behemoth of a pokémon enter the cave. It just…stood outside, if the tracks were anything to go by. It peaked Leo's curiosity, and he decided he had to find out what was in that cave.
Leo double checked his torches, tapping the sticky ends of the three short sticks, and nodding to himself. He was proud of his creations, mostly because it had been quite the process to make them. Normally he'd use a can or something to melt pine sap, thus creating a gummy, flammable material he could put on the end of stick to use as a torch (or use as glue, but that was beside the point), but with a lack of said can or any container that might work, Leo had…struggled. He'd made it work eventually by melting the sap on the flat of his big skarmory feather, but it was still an annoyingly tedious process.
"Right, let's get in, then back out," Leo said, standing and igniting one of his torches in the small fire he had built off to his left before kicking it out. A small curl of smoke rose from the ashes, but quickly vanished. Gripping his spare torches in his spare hand and rolling his shoulders, his pack shifting to a more comfortable position with the action, Leo boldly delved into the cave.
The entrance quickly narrowed from a six-foot-wide hole in the mountainside to a four-foot-tall and two foot wide passage that left Leo crouching to pass through and immediately worried this cave would turn out to be nothing. The cool air of the cave sent goosebumps running up Leo's arms, his footsteps echoing down the chamber as his torch cast flickering shadows on the wall. He was already lamenting the fact that he didn't have a smokeless light source – the smoke had nowhere to go here, which forced it into Leo's face.
Still, even through watery eyes and the dim, almost unreliable orange glow of his torch, he did manage to spot the geodude as it sat perfectly still in the middle of the cave floor. For all intents and purposes it looked like three lumps of stone sticking out of the ground, but Leo could see the almost too-uniform curve of its arms and fists, and the evidence of it having moved recently in the form of scrape marks on the ground.
"I see you," Leo grumbled, gingerly stepping around the unmoving pokémon. After his first mishap with getting punched by a geodude, Leo made a point to learn how to identify them from regular rocks. While he wasn't perfect – mistakes which had cost him a few more bruises – he was getting the hang of it.
Grinning to himself, Leo waved his torch back and forth in front of him, almost putting the tiny flame out with the aggressive movement. He panicked as it flickered dangerously, freezing instantly and praying that the flame wouldn't die. At least he could still see the light from the entrance from here, though, as it was just fifty feet back, but he still didn't want to stumble in the dark.
"Just a little further, then I'll head back," Leo whispered to himself, taking a deep breath to calm his nerves as the torch flame settled. Forging ahead once more with only a foot or two of light to guide the way, he swiftly came up on a small bend in the cave, which, when he rounded the corner, came to a dead end. A cave-in was what it looked like, with rocks all piled up on top of each other in a sloping wave.
A wave of disappointment washed over Leo as he stared at the cave in and frowned, shaking his head sadly as he turned to head back the way he came. His foot bumped against something solid and sent it clattering along the floor, and Leo furrowed his brows as he turned to look at it. The sound it made was distinctly…metallic. Crouching down, Leo lowered his torch to the floor, searching for what had made that sound.
It took a little bit to find, mostly because the metal ball had been completely encased with rust by this point and thus blended in better with the dusty, almost sandy tan ground, but find it he did. The large ball was split open down the middle, revealing a hollow interior and a hinge that connected two sides, almost like a chest. A strange design swirled up the sides and a large button-like appendage resided on top of it. Leo inspected it closely, setting down his spare torches to pick it up. It was heavier than he expected.
"It can't be. This can't be a pokeball, can it?" Leo mused aloud, looking back at the collapsed wall. He could vaguely remember seeing something similar to this ball in one of the old pokémon movies, the one with Celebi and Ash time-travelling, but he wasn't certain.
An idea began to take root in Leo's mind and he sighed, carefully moving forward and sticking his lit torch in between two rocks, so he wouldn't have to hold it. Then he lit another one in the fire of his first torch, and found a new place to put it so it illuminated the wall further. He saved his last torch just in case and took a deep breath, carefully examining the cave-in.
When he found the skeleton hidden off to the right-most side of the cave wall, its bones covered in grey dust and cracked almost beyond recognition, Leo felt neither joy nor surprise. He just sat back on his haunches and stared at the empty eye sockets of the deceased human skull, unsure what to feel.
"Poor sap," he muttered. The lower half of the person's body was crushed beneath a stone easily the size of Leo's torso, and if it hadn't been an instant death, it was most certainly fatal. Glancing at the ancient, opened pokeball, Leo felt something strange bubble up in his stomach, almost like respect. If his suspicion was right, then the person who was killed here had released his pokémon prior to their death and said pokémon might, potentially, be the same tyranitar that paced in front of the cave.
Leo brushed aside those thoughts and began searching for more items on his hands and knees, feeling bad that he was looting what was essentially a grave, but also knowing that if there was anything else here, it could be a huge help. Even the pokeball, rusted though it was, could be used for a variety of purposes. Creating pine pitch, for example. It'd make a fine substitute for a can.
His hands flew with a desperate fury as he worked, eyeing his torches and praying they would stay alight long enough for him to complete his search.
Though his time was short, he did manage to find two more similarly opened pokeballs and the tattered remains of a backpack, tossed a few feet away from the skeleton and half-crushed by another fallen rock. It was mostly useless, the fabric moldy and decayed and anything potentially useful most likely drug away by scavengers, but Leo did find something interesting. Stashed away in a side pocket that was miraculously intact was a decent sized leather-bound book with yellowing pages and smudged ink.
Excitement coursed through Leo's veins as he gathered up his finds, shoving them in his own backpack and lighting his final torch. The other two were tossed carelessly to the ground, where they fizzled out on the cool ground as Leo hightailed it out of the cave. He accidentally kicked the geodude on his way out, and though it leapt from its resting place with an angry grunt Leo was already too far gone, all but sprinting out of the cave and stopping next to the smoldering remains of his fire, breathing heavily.
"I don't ever want to go in a cave again," Leo said, shuddering at the thought and putting out his torch. The skeleton only confirmed everything he feared about going underground – the cave could and would collapse and kill him. "But in the meantime, lets get out of here. I don't want to be around if the tyranitar comes back," With a grunt of effort Leo rose to his feet and double-checked his heading, making sure he was heading back to his camp based on the position of the sun and his relative position to key landmarks on the mountainsides, before heading off at a brisk pace.
Leo rubbed his eyes as he stared at the book, gingerly turning the pages so as not to break the yellowing paper. When he first opened the book – a journal, he had come to realize – he had been more than a little disappointed. Not only was the writing smudged, water having bled through the pack it had been in and ruining a few of the pages, but it had appeared to be in an entirely different language. It wasn't really unexpected, now that Leo thought about it, but it had been disappointing.
That is, until he began to recognize the alphabet.
It was almost funny, Leo thought to himself as he ran his finger along a passage, slowly deciphering it, that the pokémon world even used pokémon as their alphabet. It wasn't that it was a foreign language, rather, the pokémon world had adopted the unown as a writing system. He recognized most of the capital letters as typical unown shapes, it was the lower-case letters which were giving him trouble. He was getting it down, slowly but surely, but it was a process.
"…the monsters have…grown aggressive lately. I will have…to…in-vestigate route four soon," Leo parsed out, sounding out each word individually. "Dang, Archibald, you really kept a detailed journal, didn't you?" Leo asked, sticking a blade of grass in-between the pages so he didn't lose his spot and flipping back to the front.
There, written on the inside of the front cover, was the author's first name and a smudge that could have once been his last; Archibald. Leo had only read a few pages, but already it seemed like Archibald had led an interesting life. Seemed to be a fairly powerful trainer, too, though Leo couldn't tell just from the writing. He'd been asked to handle an issue on the routes, and though Archibald had mentioned a few of his pokémon they were nicknamed so he couldn't tell what they were.
"Slooow?" a dopey voice called and Leo smiled, closing the book and setting it to the side as he looked up at the slowpoke that had come to say goodnight. The pink creature ambled up to Leo's fire, carefully maneuvering around the small blaze to butt its head against Leo's shoulder. The gentle movement still threatened to knock Leo over though, hiding the dopey creature's deceptive strength.
"Heya, King. Coming to say goodnight? Everyone's falling asleep early tonight, must be tired," Leo said, scratching the slowpoke who Leo had dubbed King behind its round ears. The slowpoke's skin was still wet from the lake, though Leo didn't really mind much. "You done doing your rounds, making sure everyone's settled?" he continued absently, looking out over the lake. The rest of the slowpoke herd had already settled in for the night, the dying light of the sun slowly fading, having already hidden itself behind the mountains. Leo probably wouldn't even have enough light to read by soon.
"Slooow," King called, cocking its head to the side and eyeing Leo's fire.
"Don't you dare. You know I need that," Leo chided, gently pushing the slowpoke's muzzle away from the fire. King didn't respond but also didn't put out his fire again, something he had struggled to teach the slowpoke about for weeks, so Leo figured he got the gist. "I'll be up for a bit longer, you don't need to worry about me. I'm going to work on my spear a bit then I'll head to bed," Leo told King. The slowpoke remained still for a few minutes, Leo content to stare at the brilliant orange coals of his fire with some company. Then it turned and trundled off, sound a low call as it once again began to circle the slowpoke herd.
"You're not ready to sleep either, huh?" Leo asked with a chuckle, watching King as it ambled slowly along, nudging one of the slowbro as it went. He watched the slowpoke for a minute before shaking his head and turning his attention to the palm-sized skarmory feather shard he had found, and the long, straight-ish tree branch he was trying to attach it to, leaning up against the tree next to him.
For a little bit he had used the shard as a sort of hatchet, burying the shard in a thick branch and using it that way until he figured out the sword worked better for that purpose. So he had spent the past few weeks trying to make a spear out of it, with little luck. The primitive and still-not-perfect cordage he'd been making out of grass fibers wasn't strong enough to handle rough impacts, and whenever he tried to fix the tip to the spear in other ways it would, for one reason or another, fail.
It wasn't like he really needed a spear though, he was getting proficient with his atlatl even if he hadn't killed anything with it yet, it would just be fun to have.
Maybe he was getting a little lax, now that he was figuring things out and getting comfortable in his survival. Leo hummed to himself as he worked, trying to wedge the spear tip into a small groove he had carved into the makeshift haft. He wrestled with it, and struggled a bit, trying not to press on the edges so he didn't cut himself, and eventually gave up when the haft started to split. Leo sighed, wresting the spearhead out of the shaft and tossing it to the side in annoyance.
It wasn't long before his fire began to die out and, with a little bit of reluctance, Leo turned and crawled into his bed. He had really lucked out with this find – a medium sized hole had been dug beneath the roots of a particularly tall pine and Leo had literally stumbled upon it. All it took was a little bit of digging and Leo had a decent little hidey hole, and sure he had to curl up into a ball in order to fit, but there was very little chance he would be seen and he would be kept warm when he crawled into it. It had been his bed for the past two days, in fact, and worked beautifully.
Leo shuddered a bit as the temperature continued to drop, sharper than he expected, and eyed the dull orange glow of the remains of his fire. If it rained hard he could be in for a rough night, especially if his hole started to fill with water. But sleepiness overtook his concern and, after crawling inside and pulling his backpack in front of the hole to add another layer of protection, he soon drifted off to sleep.
A chill ran down Leo's spine, his eyes snapping wide open to stare at the dirt wall in front of him. It was so dark he almost couldn't see directly in front of him. Yet, as he let out a short, silent breath, his breath came out in a white puff. Adrenaline was already spiking through his system when he woke, the cold that embraced him largely ignored thanks to that, but now it quickly settled into an icy calm. Something was wrong.
The forest was dead silent. Not a sound could be heard, and when Leo slowly turned his head to peer out of his hole past his backpack, he could see the layer of white that covered his fire pit. His eyes narrowed. He dared not move, even the sound of his heart beating seemed too loud as he strained his senses, searching for anything that might give him a clue as to what was going on.
A dark shape skittered past the entrance, soft chitters reaching Leo's ears in the near-silence. He nearly flinched when something skittered over the top of his den, landing softly in front of the entrance. A singular sleek, black leg was visible through Leo's peep hole, red feathers stretching down to brush the ground behind it. Leo tensed, pressing his feet against the dirt wall behind him and preparing to leap out if the pokémon noticed him.
For a moment, nothing happened, and it seemed like it would just move on. The creature stood there, then slowly turned and began to shuffle around, messing around with Leo's backpack. It paused, and Leo held his breath one clawed hand reached around the edge of the pack, its head lowering to look in at Leo with piercing red eyes.
"HAAAAAH!" Leo roared, launching himself out of his hole and slamming into his backpack, which in turn hit the pokémon. It yelped in surprise as it was tossed away, skittering off into the darkness as Leo scrambled to his feet, his head whipping back and forth wildly in search of the pokémon. His mind quickly processed what he'd seen – black fur, red feathers, bipedal, ice on the firepit – a mild curse left his lips as he snatched up the spear haft. He could only think of one pokémon that fit that description.
"Sneasel," he ground out, taking a fighting stance and levelling his weapon at the dark forest. He dared not risk crossing the firepit to reach the skarmory sword – it was too unwieldy for him anyway – as he searched for the pokémon. The trees and bushes that had made up this part of the forest were nothing more than dark blobs to his eyes, a white mist filling the air and making visibility even worse. Every once in a while dark shapes flitted between trees and around bushes, chittering and hissing to each other ominously through the trees.
A sudden burst of freezing wind sent Leo to shivering, ice forming on his t-shirt and in his hair, his eyes narrowing as he sought out his aggressor. Red eyes flashed at him, and claws scratched on trees as multiple sneasel darted about through the trees.
Leo's blood ran cold. Sneasel were pack pokémon, and as a young, defenseless human without any pokémon to defend himself with, Leo was prime prey. Perhaps even better than the slowpoke herd behind him – at least they had methods to fight back with. Another blast of icy cold wind was shot at him but this time Leo moved out of the way, only able to detect it from the sound of leaves rustling. It left a fine sheen of white on the ground, and basked the trunk of a tree in a layer of white.
What could only be described as snickers echoed from all around – above, in front, behind – and Leo shuddered as terror began to grip him, his heart hammering and breathing coming in short, ragged bursts. Then one sneasel revealed itself, black fur blending in so well with the dark night that it was only ten feet away when Leo noticed it. The bipedal 'mon stared at him with piercing red eyes, the red feathers on top of its head twitching in anticipation as it rubbed its claws together menacingly. The yellow dot on its forehead was almost bewitching as it slowly, methodically advanced. Leo let out a long, slow breath, accepting what was about to happen.
The fear he had been feeling drained from his body as he settled, fixing his posture slightly and shifting his attention away from the visible sneasel. He could already hear footsteps running up behind him and Leo tensed, whirling around with his staff swinging, catching the leaping sneasel in the side and sending it hurling away with a yowl of surprise. In the next second he was swinging back around, forcing the other sneasel to back off to avoid the swing. It snarled at him, and Leo did the only logical response.
He snarled back.
"Get back here!" He snapped, advancing on the sneasel with sharp thrusts from his staff, not unlike how he would use a spear. The sneasel hissed at him and scampered off, well out of Leo's reach but remained visible, eyeing him carefully.
Leo huffed and glanced around, keeping his eyes on the ground and trees above him, slowly backing up towards the lake. If he could get his back to the water, at least that way the sneasel wouldn't be able to gang up on him from all sides, and he might even be able to draw the help of the slowpoke herd.
The sneasel seemingly did not follow, and Leo didn't understand why until one of them dropped onto his back from the trees above. Sharp claws dug into his shoulders and Leo howled in pain, dropping his staff when icy coldness began to flood through his bloodstream. The rest of the sneasel howled in unison, charging forward to attack, abandoning stealth. The large creature on his back hissed and rumbled, looking far larger than its brethren as it reared back in preparation for another attack, its maw wide open to reveal rows of razor sharp teeth.
Leo moved then, ignoring the pain simply moving his arms brought as he reached over his right shoulder and shoved as much of his hand as he could into his aggressor's mouth, curling it into a fist around its tongue. Pain flashed through Leo once more as it retracted its claws and leapt off, its teeth leaving scratch marks on his fist as it choked and spluttered, the slimy tongue slipping out of Leo's grasp. The rest of the sneasel skidded to a halt and Leo risked a glance over his shoulder to get a good look at the sneasel – no, the freaking weavile – that had wounded him.
It was tall, shoulder-height at least, with sharp claws covered in a black-ish substance and red eyes that promised death as it glared at Leo. Leo's shoulders sagged as he stood there, his arms dropping to his sides as warmth spread down his shoulders. He growled at the weavile, who growled back and once more began to advance. Leo whirled on it and charged, the weavile's eyes growing wide in surprise as Leo kicked it in the chest, putting all his strength into the blow. The weavile wheezed as it stumbled backward, eyes flashing and claws further unsheathing as it growled hatefully, feet digging into the ground, ready to attack once more –
Only to be sent flying as a pink mass crashed into it, heralded by a furious "SLOOOOW!" The weavile hissed furiously as it landed, eyes narrowing as it glared at who Leo recognized as King, the slowpoke livelier now than he had ever seen it. A blue glow radiated from its eyes, sticks and rocks hurtling from some unseen force at the weavile, who batted the projectiles away with its claws and breathed out a vicious wave of ice. King weathered it unfalteringly, growling in the back of its throat.
Jets of water blasted through the trees as the slowpoke herd advanced, catching a few of the sneasel off-guard if their yowls of pain were anything to go by. Leo gulped in relief and fear, glad that the slowpoke herd had decided to attack, but both afraid for them and for the pain that echoed deep in his shoulders. The latter he could ignore for now thanks to adrenaline – which Leo hoped meant it wasn't too bad – but the slowpoke were another matter. Sneasel were part dark-type, which meant they had the advantage over the psychic-type slowpoke.
Sneasel launched themselves with indignant shrieks at the slowpoke, who retaliated with headbutts and jets of water as they engaged, King duking it out with the weavile while the slowbro stayed back, observing the battle with watchful eyes. Then one fixated its gaze on Leo, its eyes glowing blue, and cocked its head to the side.
This distraction cost Leo, as he mistakenly assumed the sneasel would ignore him in favor of taking out the slowpoke. A dark blur leapt through the air, sharp claws raking across his chest and drawing a scream from him as he stumbled backward, falling flat on the ground. The sneasel leapt upon him but Leo, with pure instinct guiding his movements, shoved his feet upward in a kick, catching the little monster in the chest and sending it stumbling away, where a fierce blast of water sent it sprawling.
A slowbro suddenly loomed over Leo, staring down at him curiously as a wave of pink energy burst from its body, washing over Leo and the nearby slowpoke. His chest and shoulders tightened, pain dulling significantly but strength escaping him as the energy soothed him. Leo let out a breath as the slowbro moved back once more, its massive spiked tail nearly smacking Leo as he tried to sit up.
Whatever the slowbro had done hadn't fully healed him – he still hurt, and the wound on his chest was now a massive scab – but now he could at least defend himself. Leo looked up, glancing around the battlefield. There were only a dozen or so sneasel in the pack – merely half of the twenty or so slowpoke – but they did have the upper hand. King was still duking it out with the weavile, keeping the agile monster at bay for now as they tested each other's defenses, while the other slowpoke attempted to gang up on the remaining sneasel. The sneasel, however, had the same idea, and were ganging up on the slowpoke with a minimum of two per slowpoke attacked
Anger flared in Leo's chest as he stood, charging at the nearest sneasel – who just so happened to be latched onto a slowpoke's back, slashing away – and full-body tackled it. The furry creature yowled in surprise, claws raking at Leo's arms as he pinned it to the ground and punched it in the face. The slowpoke bellowed and bodily shoved Leo out of the way, looming over the sneasel before smashing the prone creature with its head.
This seemed to set off the sneasel pack, a collective hiss echoing out in the night as they scrambled away – the sneasel Leo had attacked slashing the slowpoke's muzzle with its claws, blasting Leo with a point-black wave of icy-cold wind from its maw, and scrambling off into the darkness. Leo fell over from the attack, teeth immediately set to chattering and ice crawling on his skin. The weavile was the last to leave, snarling at King as the slowpoke stared at it unblinking, and breathed a blast of freezing cold air at the herd as a parting gift.
For a moment nothing moved, the slowpoke staring off into the night, uncaring of their wounds as they made sure the pack was gone. After a few minutes they relaxed, one by one ambling towards the slowbro, who stood unharmed in the back. Leo remained where he was, breathing heavily as he lay flat on his back. Pain slowly crept up on him, stabbing deep into his shoulders and radiating in waves across his chest, which was bleeding again.
Then waves of pink energy blasted out from the slowbro, washing over the slowpoke herd and even catching Leo, as he lay on the edge of their range.
His skin crawled as it stitched itself back together, feeling far weaker with each successive burst of energy, but the pain was lessening and, when he touched his chest tentatively, Leo's wounds were healing. He let out a long, slow breath, feeling dangerously close to passing out. Well, he thought as he lay there, another wave of energy washing over him. At least I survived. But now I need to get a fire started before I freeze to death. He thought with a shudder, sitting up and dusting the snow off of his arms and now-ruined shirt.
The skin on his shoulders and chest pulled angrily as Leo stood, wincing at the sensation, and moved over to his small wood pile, miraculously untouched by the battle. It took a hot minute for Leo to assemble the kindling and fumble with his matches, not trusting his shaking hands enough to properly use flint and steel, but eventually he got the fire started. Soon enough a small blaze licked at the wood, the warmth from the flames soaking into Leo's skin as he fed it. Satisfied with the size of the fire he lay sidewise, exposing as much of himself as he could to the warmth that slowly chased away the biting cold.
Even a few slowpoke joined him, ambling over and flopping down next to the fire with low groans.
"I agree," Leo murmured in response, eyes fluttering shut. He was coming down from the adrenaline high, and probably was woozy from blood loss or something, but right now he was too tired to rationalize anything. His last thought before he fell asleep before the fire, was of pokémon. "I need a pokémon," he muttered, and slipped into dreamland.
The next day Leo and the slowpoke gorged themselves. The healing move the slowbro had used, which Leo could only assume was heal pulse, had left Leo and the slowpoke herd noticeably thinner and weaker. He could only assume that was because the wounds had to use something to fix themselves up with, and it wasn't raw "magic healing power" heal pulse used. This led to the routine feasting of fish, insects, and edible plants for both Leo and the slowpoke, the slowpoke surprising Leo by showing that they did, in fact, know about the potato plant, as they dug up the tubers in mass quantities.
By midday, basking in the warmth of the sun by laying on a rock, Leo felt almost human again. If one didn't count the torn, blood-soaked shirt that clothed him, and the pervasive weakness in his limbs. It'd take more than just one day of good eating to get back up to tip-top shape, Leo was sure.
Still, as he lay on a large rock by the edge of the lake, two slowpoke laying below him in the mud as they all basked in the sun, beedrill buzzing on the far edge of the water and murkrow cawing as they flew through the air, Leo turned his thoughts to the previous night. The slash on his chest was an angry red line, sure to leave a scar, same as the two holes on his shoulders. He shuddered at the memory, and how lucky he'd been with that. Had he not been near the slowpoke, or had they chosen not to come battle the sneasel, he would have been dinner. It was plain and simple.
Honestly, Leo had prepared himself for the possibility of being attacked by a predator. He'd imagined fighting an ursaring, a persian or luxray, and even had notions on how to fight off massive birds of prey, like pidgeot or staraptor. Nothing had prepared him for a pack of ice-wielding creatures of the dark, and it drove home one simple fact – he was not in the world he once knew. Pokemon could do things he normally wouldn't expect, and all his survival knowledge would only get him so far in a battle against creatures who could spit literal waves of snow. This was something he knew academically before, but only now really understood.
Leo sighed and sat up, grabbing his atlatl from where it lay next to him and fitting a dart to the end as he stood, turning his back to the lake. A circle of rocks was set up twenty five or so feet away from the boulder and Leo, after aiming for a second, hurled his dart at it. It stabbed into the ground two feet to the left of the circle, making Leo frown.
"Way I see it, there are two solutions here, guys," Leo said to the slowpoke down below as he sat back down, propping his chin up on his fist. "Either I figure out how to fight and hide myself better, or I somehow find a partner pokémon to help me out. What do you think?" he asked. The two slowpoke looked up at him and, after a delay that stretched minutes, responded in low calls.
"Sloooow," they rumbled.
"Both? Well yeah, doing both is a good idea, but I don't really know where to start with taming a pokémon. No offense guys, but I'm not sure I want to rely on you in times of trouble. Besides, I don't really want to take any of you from your herd yet," Leo reasoned with them.
"Sloooooooow,"
"Yeah, I know, but really, as much as I love you as pokémon now, I think I need something that can hide with me and travel with me. You slowpoke seem mostly confined to the river," Leo argued. "Don't get me wrong, if I ever do become a trainer I'll absolutely seek you all out and see if anyone wants to join me on whatever journey, but until then I'm going to keep mooching off of you, and mostly leave you be. Hey, I'll even be your early warning system, like I was with the sneasel. Because I'm pretty sure they were coming to prey on you all originally, what with the type advantage and how fat you all are."
"Slow," the slowpoke said. Leo sighed and rubbed his face, nodding.
"Yes, that is assuming I actually get back to civilization in the first place, I know. But let's get back to the matter at hand; finding a partner and befriending it through the power of anime. It's not like I have any pokeballs, those ancient ones are busted through and through, nor do I really think I have some superpower to befriend any pokémon I come across. I've got to be reasonable here, but befriending a pokémon might be my only option. Beyond that, I don't know the first thing about training. It's not like I have a manual or any –" Leo cut himself off and straightened his back so quickly it cracked, his eyes widening.
"Waitaminute. I may just have a training manual. Stay here guys, I'll be back," Leo said, ending his imaginary conversation with the slowpoke and jumping off the boulder, running back toward his camp. He largely ignored the splashes of blood and obvious signs of a scuffle as he searched for Archibald's book, and laughed triumphantly when he found it, safely tucked away in his backpack which had been largely left alone.
Returning to the rock and clambering up it, Leo flipped open the pages and grinned down at the words. "Now, lets see what secrets you hold, hmm?"
Wood cracked against wood as Leo danced around the tree, ignoring the way his chest and shoulder muscles pulled tightly with each movement. His staff – for it was just a staff now, as long as it didn't have a spear head – was held loosely in front of him, levelled at his target as he focused. He swept and twirled his staff, practicing motions he hadn't used in far too long with a body far too small, striking firmly at the tree and working out his aggression.
Sweat beaded down his forehead from the exertion and Leo let out a breath, relaxing slightly and dropping his shoulders. He hadn't even been working that hard, but he was still light-headed from the sneasel attack and healing two days ago, so any exercise was a bit harder on him. Which really only served to irritate him further, as he took a deep breath and glared at the book set next to his backpack to the right.
It wasn't the fact that it wasn't really a training diary, and that Leo had to infer how to train and tame pokémon based on how Archibald described soothing other pokémon – discounting the idea of using one pokémon to beat up another – that had Leo worked up. Nor was it that the book was so dry and boring it had taken a full two days just to get through. That he hadn't been sleeping well out of paranoia and fear didn't help either, but right now that wasn't the big issue. No, what really worked him up was the name that had popped up on the very last page of the book and what it signified.
Grunting, Leo moved over to the journal and, after dropping his staff, flipped it open to the last filled-in page, about three quarters of the way through. He had to read it again, for the fifteenth time, just to make sure he read it right.
Its been three weeks since I reached the Silver Mountains, and I think I'm getting close. A nearby cave system holds some promise – serious seismic activity indicates onix activity below, which could be the cause of the mass agitation of pokemon in the area. With any luck I'll be in and out in a reasonable period of time. I'd hate to be here when that blizzard hits. Plus, I want to see Sam's first Elite Four battle. At the rate he's going, it won't be a surprise if there's another Oak claiming the title of champion by the end of next year. Guess the shadow I cast wasn't that intimidating, huh?
And that was it. No follow up, no nothing, but based on context from the rest of the journal it was clear that Archibald was the father of Sam. Samuel Oak to be precise, which was too coincidental of a name to be anyone but the original pokémon professor himself.
Leo ground his teeth, unsure whether to scream in rage or laugh. This was all just…way too coincidental. Of course he would find the journal of Professor Oak's deceased father.
"Where you're meant to be," Leo muttered mockingly, glaring up at the sky. "I see what you're doing, and I'm unamused!" he shouted, clenching his fists.
"Sloooow," one of the slowpoke called in answer. Leo rolled his eyes and sat down, rubbing his face. He sighed and moaned and groaned for a bit before standing and heading off in search of more food, wiping away all of his thoughts. The problem with the journal could come later. There were other problems to solve first, mostly revolving around his continued survival, and Leo intended to work on rectifying them.
So, whistling and singing a merry tune that wasn't mirrored by his actual feelings, Leo headed off into the forest, his goal set. Food, and then a pokémon.
4
The furrett scrabbled in the dirt, the weasel-like pokemon digging up nuts and mushrooms and munching on them happily. Leo watched from his spot up in the pine tree, lounging like a panther on a thick branch ten feet of the ground. One arm dangled over the branch, his opposite leg hanging down as well, while his chin rested on his other hand – eyes watching the wildlife that passed below. The furrett, so far, had been his most frequent companion, and he found watching the playful creature to be a blast.
Everything seemed to be a game to it. Even when it would pick up a pinecone to dig at the nuts hidden inside, it would flip it around and toss it in the air, playing with it like a ball or something. Then it would race around trees, seemingly chasing its own tail, scrabbling up and down tree trunks and rolling in the dirt; just having a grand old time. Every once in a while another pokemon would appear, mostly rattatta or various bird pokemon, and the furrett would go charging off, chasing the pokemon in what appeared to be an impromptu game of tag. A game only the furrett seemed to be playing.
Had it not been a game, Leo was sure the pidgey it had pinned to the ground earlier would have been killed or eaten, not set free with a proud swish of the furrett's tail.
Speaking of pidgey, off to his right a pidgey chirped and Leo whistled back, the noise catching the furrett's attention as it looked up, holding a half-destroyed pinecone in its paws. It chittered something and went back to work, bits and pieces of the pinecone flying everywhere as it tore it to shreds.
Leo hummed to himself, pondering the merits of taming a wild sentret or furrett. Though in the games they were weak pokemon, he'd always held a soft spot for ferrets and weasels back in his home world. Plus it would be great to have a companion that was more knowledgeable about foraging than he – they were sure to be able to find all kinds of goodies to eat. Maybe they'd even find one of the famed berry bushes from the games, and wouldn't that be great. Leo missed fruit. Unfortunately, it was doubtful he'd be able to tame this furrett. If Archibald's journal was anything to go by, it was far easier to tame baby or young pokemon, or, barring that, adult pokemon with the aid of another pokemon.
Which means he'd have to search for a young sentret, if he decided upon the furrett line.
"I'll just keep my options open, I guess," Leo yawned, sitting up and stretching. The movement startled the furrett, who sat bolt upright and stared at Leo with wide, unblinking eyes. Leo waved at it with a smile, grabbing the branch with both hands and dropping into a hang before letting go and hitting the ground with a thud. By the time he looked up the furrett was gone, pinecone forgotten as it scrambled off. Leo laughed, scratching the back of his head and walking away, his torn shirt billowing annoyingly in the gentle wind. He'd have to find a replacement for it soon.
Maybe he'd try making a grass shirt, right around the time he wove the hat he'd been promising himself he'd make for…well a long time. How many days or weeks had it been now?
"Problem is that I can't make anything better than that. I have no idea where to start with tanning a hide, and I still haven't successfully hunted anything yet," he said with a frown, shoving his hands in his pockets. "Should probably get on that last bit,"
A pidgey, different than the one he'd just been whistling to, as evidenced by the shortened length of its tail feathers and smaller body, flitted onto a tree branch in front of Leo. It chirped and Leo responded with another whistle, to which it whistled back. Leo grinned at it.
"What about you, huh? Want to be my pokemon partner? I can help you find food – well, not really, but the point stands," Leo asked. The pidgey just cocked its head to the side and chirped again before it flew off in a furious beating of its wings. "Thought not. Why would you? You're probably wondering what this funny looking two-legged is even talking about."
With another sigh, Leo shook his head and continued on, no destination really in mind.
Leo fumbled with the long blade of grass, watching the sunflora out of the corner of his eye as he tried to mimic the way they formed the grass whistle. He folded it length-wise, and tried to curl the edges into a dome to blow on it, but nothing seemed to work. He scowled and tossed the coarse blade of grass, plucking another, shorter one, and attempting to blow on it. He glanced one more time at the sunflora, who were happily blowing away on their instruments now, pulled the blade of grass taut and tried again, blowing on it length-wise.
When a sharp whistle sounded out, Leo grinned happily. Then he flinched and leaned back behind the bush he had been using as cover, watching the sunflora through the branches. They glanced his way for a moment, then cooed softly to one another and continued to play with their whistles. Leo let out a breath, relaxing slightly. He didn't want to spook the placid creatures, watching them was quite a bit of fun, actually, though he held no real hope of befriending or taming them. Maybe if he could find a sunkern, but at that point the real question was how much kelp a sunkern could actually be. He'd seen the tiny pokemon around, and doubted their usefulness in his situation.
Leo shrugged and turned back to the sunflora, peeking around the bush and listening to the tune they were playing, trying to memorize it. He hummed along to the tune, tapping his leg with one hand as if adding a drum beat, as his eyes tracked a few hoppip as they floated through the blue skies on a gentle breeze. Soon enough the sunflora quit their playing and turned to face the sun, their large yellow faces basking in the noon-day sun's rays. Leo remained still for a few more minutes before slowly standing up and backing off, leaving the sunflora behind. He supposed it was just about time for lunch and a nap, midday was perfect for naps, but first he had a whistle to play around with.
Muttering to himself as he walked, Leo blew on the blade of grass and recoiled sharply when it sounded much more like an animal cry than the musical tune the sunflora had been playing. He frowned and tried again, blowing at different speeds and only succeeding at playing an intermittent noise. A brief wind blew, making his torn shirt billow and flutter annoyingly.
"Harder than it looks," he muttered, pausing in his walking to rework his grip on the grass, trying to work it again. A few sharp, short blasts of noise later that were sounding increasingly like animal cries, Leo was broken from his focus by a sharp tug on his pants leg. He looked down in confusion, freezing when he spotted the bellossom standing right next to him, smiling up at him and still gripping his pants leg.
Leo dared not move, but the bellossom had no such qualms. With a simple motion it let go of his pants, reached down to its petal dress, and plucked off one of the leaves, offering the yellow leaf up to Leo. Unsure of what else to do, he slowly reached out and grabbed it, eyes never leaving the bellossom, whose smile was unwavering.
The pokemon cooed softly, holding both hands beside its mouth and blowing softly. Leo cocked his head to the side and glanced at the leaf, then back at the bellossom. No way, he thought, realization as to what the bellossom wanted slowly dawning upon him. He brought the leaf to his mouth and, holding it like he had been holding the grass, put his lips on it and blew. At first there was no sound, so Leo readjusted his lips and tried again, this time a clear, ringing sound echoing out.
With a giggle the bellossom twirled, a soft ringing reverberating from it. Leo gaped. The bellossom laughed and, with a wave, wandered back to the small gaggle of oddish hiding poorly in a section of short grass.
Leo started walking again, slowly, glancing over his shoulder at the bellossom that was playing with the oddish now, paying him no heed. He blew on the leaf experimentally again, rubbed his forehead, and groaned as he finally regained his mental faculties.
"That's just…wow," Leo murmured. That bellossom showed a level of intelligence and understanding he had not been expecting, with a very simple action. It opened up a whole new slew of possibilities to Leo, though he needed some time to process all this. Really, he'd known that in the anime and such pokemon showed high degrees of intelligence at times, but he hadn't been expecting it. Up until this point, he'd only really seen the base "animalistic" side of pokemon. Meaning they weren't stupid by any stretch of the imagination, but they weren't…human, either.
"Once again, I am shown how little I actually know about this place," Leo muttered. "I'm just bumbling about like a freaking child, aren't I?"
A sharp jab to his ribs sent Leo stumbling away, scrambling to keep ahold of himself and not get knocked to the ground again. The tyrogue advanced, the scarred fighting-type not giving him much room to breathe, and launched a few experimental jabs. Leo largely ignored them, moving only the bare minimum to avoid the deliberately slow punches, and waited for an opportunity to strike back. Leo had thought he'd been lucky to stumble upon a tyrogue, the fighting type being really rare in the games, according to his memory, but he hadn't expected it to immediately rush him for a fight.
"Jerk," Leo hissed, twisting out of the way as it tried to bodily tackle him. Without missing a beat Leo lashed out with his foot, catching the tyrogue in the back and sending it off-balance, stumbling forward. It whirled on him before he could take advantage of it being off-balance, yellow eyes narrowing as it locked onto him.
"You're going to have to do better than a tackle," Leo taunted, resettling into his stance, hands set into a loose, open palm. He shifted his feet and sunk his knees, letting out a breath to settle down as he prepared to fight once more. He'd already taken a few good hits – it was time to get some payback.
The tyrogue growled at Leo, setting its fists in a way he imagined a boxer would, and rushed him. Leo took advantage of his reach over the little monster, batting away its jabs with open palms before sliding forward, punching at the tyrogue. It spun out of the way, only allowing Leo a glancing blow, its foot snapping out and hitting Leo in the shin as it tried to create some distance. Leo wasn't having it, however, and gave chase, momentarily forgetting himself as he advanced.
The tyrogue whirled on him quite suddenly, leaping into the air with more height than Leo had expected and slamming its foot into Leo's face. His head snapped back and he stumbled, disoriented from the pain, when the tyrogue started to punch him in the gut with a series of sharp jabs.
"Knock it off!" Leo roared, pain transforming into anger as he lashed out, snagging one of the tyrogue's arms in one hand and punching it in the face with his other. It twisted and fought against Leo's grip but he didn't let go, yanking the tyrogue close and kneeing it in the gut, followed by an elbow to the side of the head that had it falling to its knees. Leo let go of the tyrogue, breathing heavily and bleeding from his nose and taking a few steps back. "You done?" he asked, raising one eyebrow.
The tyrogue looked up at him and grinned toothily, rising to its feet and howling a savage warcry as it once again leapt at Leo, covering the distance in a single jump and ramming its mohawk-like head spikes into his gut. Leo wheezed and fell to the ground, the tyrogue landing on top of him and recovering first. Two punches to the face later and Leo rolled sharply to the side, tossing the tyrogue off of him and rising to his feet in one smooth motion, scrambling to block and dodge the strikes of the tyrogue.
"Fine," Leo ground out between dodges. "If that's how you want to play, then lets play," he snapped, switching immediately to the offensive. Once again he tried to grab the tyrogue's arm, but this time it was expecting it. The moment Leo's hand clenched around its small, thin arm, the tyrogue was already leaping into the air, yanking Leo down with his own grasp on it and driving its forehead into Leo's face. Leo yelped and let go, freeing the tyrogue, who immediately went to work punching Leo's gut.
The fight swiftly ended after that, the tyrogue knocking Leo to the ground with a sweeping kick to the knee, followed by a one-two punch that laid him out flat on his back. Pain radiated from Leo's body as he lay there, bleeding from his face and seeing stars fly circles in the sky – only a few puffy white clouds marring the sight. The grassy meadow rustled in a light breeze, the cool grass feeling good on his aching head. Leo could vaguely hear the tyrogue celebrating through the ringing in his ears, and he scowled, rolling over and pushing himself up. Blood pooled in his mouth that he spat out, wincing as his tongue found a loose tooth.
"Hey," Leo croaked, lifting his head and glaring at the tyrogue, who had turned to regard him curiously. "Get back here. I'm not done with you yet," he snarled angrily. The pain that came with moving only served to piss Leo off more.
The tyrogue grinned and charged at Leo once more, who remained on his knees. He waited, and waited, and just before the tyrogue reached him he leapt forward, slamming into the smaller creature's chest with his shoulder and knocking it to the ground. It tried to roll backwards as Leo scrabbled to his feet, kicking the rising tyrogue like a football and sending it sprawling once more. Before it could move Leo leapt upon it, snaking his arms around its body, pinning its arms to its chest and locking it in a headlock, his legs locking together and pressing the tyrogue's legs to the ground, its body pressed against his chest.
"Yield," he snarled, tightening his grip on the tyrogue as it struggled, thrashing this way and that in a vain attempt to escape its bigger and stronger captor. Leo would know, he'd spent enough time being pinned in this exact same position from his older brother. "I know you understand me, now yield!" Leo roared.
For a moment the tyrogue stilled, and just when Leo thought the tyrogue had listened it started to yell and glow a bright white-blue color.
"For the love of -" he shouted, shoving the tyrogue away and scrambling backwards. He didn't know how evolution worked, and a part of him didn't want to stick around to find out, but he stood there transfixed by the metamorphosis and brilliant white glow regardless. Light spilled from the tyrogue as its body began to shift and grow, its head widening and arms and legs elongating, body filling out as a sharp spike protruded from its head. Then, with a snap, the light faded and before Leo stood a hitmontop, staring at its hands in wonder, its blue and tan fur pristine and gleaming in the midday sun.
It twisted and bent experimentally, throwing a few jabs into the air and kicking at nothing. Leo cursed his luck and took a step back, the action drawing the attention of the hitmontop to him once more. It grinned, and Leo cursed louder this time.
"This is gonna suck," Leo said, slipping into a stance again. The hitmontop let him get settled with a curious expression, then attacked. The fight was over before it even began this time, the fighting-type flipping over onto its head and spinning like a top, flashing towards Leo with blinding speed and hitting him before he even had a chance to react.
Leo felt three separate kicks hit him, once in the face and twice in the chest, the last hitting him into the air, though the pain didn't register until he hit the ground. His breath came in short, sharp breaths and he struggled to breath, coughing and rolling onto his side as darkness crept along the edges of his vision, threatening a blackout. His eyelids fluttered and Leo fought it as best he could, but to no avail as he slipped into unconsciousness.
When he came to, Leo was surprised both by the distance the sun had moved across the sky, and by the fact that he had been knocked out. It must have been at least an hour since his defeat, but it seemed like mere moments. With a groan Leo sat up, wincing as his muscles pulled and his sides ached, a pounding reverberating around his skull as he leaned forward, gripping his head in his hands.
"Lets not do that again," he muttered grumpily, just sitting there for a while. "Stupid evolution, stupid tyrogue. Why'd you have to go and attack me? I'm going to be hurting for days now," he groused, rubbing his face and looking up, then freezing as he locked eyes with another pokemon.
The tyranitar stared at him from where it stood between two trees, the coloration of its belly standing out as it watched him. It snorted, shooting dust from its nostrils, and cracked its jaws open in a yawn as it turned away, lumbering off into the forest. Leo stood after a moment, choosing not to think about the tyranitar as he took a deep breath. A groan escaped him on the exhale, his ribs and stomach aching and head throbbing.
"I just…can't today," Leo said, pushing the thought of the tyranitar out of his mind and stumbling back to the slowpoke herd. It would take a good hour or two normally, but with how gingerly he was moving now that time would probably increase a good amount. Pressing a hand to his forehead and glancing at the horizon, where dark stormclouds were looming, Leo sighed once more.
Either his luck was really good or really terrible, and usually Leo couldn't decide which it was. Today? Today, it felt like the latter.
Leo shuddered and shook as he crouched over his tiny fire, the flames barely catching on the slightly damp wood, other pieces of fuel laying about the firepit to dry. The rain had only stopped a half-hour ago, having persisted well into the night, and leaving Leo absolutely miserable. He was cold, wet, aching, and exhausted, yet unable to sleep because he was cold, wet, and aching.
Thunder rumbled and Leo sneezed, rubbing his bare shoulders futilely. He had taken his shirt off once the fire had started, the damp cloth doing more harm than good once it had been fully soaked. Normally he loved rain, he loved the sight and sounds of storms rolling in, he loved the smell it left and how everything just looked and felt clean afterwards. When he was alone in the wilderness, however, with no real form of cover, as he had been unable to find proper shelter beyond crouching behind a rock to avoid the worst of the wind, Leo found himself hating it.
"Stupid storm," Leo grumbled.
"Broooo," one of the slowbro called, yawning.
"Shut up, Bob. No one asked you," Leo snapped. Then he sighed, and held his face in his shaking hands. "Sorry, that was uncalled for. I love you, Bob," he amended.
"Slooow," one of the slowpoke said.
"Hush, Steve, I already apologized didn't I?" Leo muttered, sighing once more and rocking back away from the fire. "What am I even doing? Here I am, having a conversation with slowpoke and slowly freezing to death,"
He wasn't actually dying, not really, but that was the way Leo felt. Even when more wood had dried out and the small flame grew to a merry blaze, steam rolling off of larger sticks set next to the fire to dry, Leo still shivered, the bone-deep cold not fading any quicker. His eyes flicked away from the fire, glancing at the slowpoke herd a few dozen feet away, next to the lake and hidden in patches of tall grass. Leo found himself envious of them.
They hadn't even really cared that it rained, or was cold. The slowpoke had all the heat they needed, and could find food far easier than Leo could. He still relied heavily on them for the main source of his nutrients, after all. Most of them were even asleep now, something Leo probably wouldn't accomplish until morning, and the ground dried up.
"Alright, focus on something else, Leo. Find something to do, thinking about your misery isn't going to get you anywhere," Leo chided himself, slapping his cheeks and rising, heading over to his backpack. He silently thanked the heavens for the waterproofed canvas as he flicked it open, pulling out one of his notebooks, a pencil, and gingerly withdrawing the leaf the bellossom had given him from a side pocket. It was still perfectly healthy and vibrant, surprisingly, despite it having been a few days since his meeting with the bellossom.
"Wait, how long has it been?" Leo muttered to himself, scratching his cheek. It'd been a couple days, he knew…maybe four or five? He was losing track of time. All he knew was that the days were getting hotter and the forest had been in full bloom for a while now. "Should probably keep track of the days, and prepare to head down the mountains actually. I don't want to be here when winter hits," he muttered, rubbing his face. But, that was a problem for future Leo to figure out – the Leo of today just wanted to relax and stop hurting for a minute.
After writing and doodling for a few minutes, his hands slowly warming up as he used them, Leo began to play with the leaf. He pulled the leaf taut and blew on it, the soft ringing sound it created coming in short, discordant bursts. Leo scowled at it and huffed, trying a few more times. He never really had much musical talent in the first place, but at least the leaf was fun to play with. It only took few minutes of disjointed playing for Leo set the leaf off to the side, though, as he looked up at the stars. A part of him wondered how Jack – the friend he was certain had travelled to this world with – was doing, and what kind of a situation he was in. Leo hoped it he had been deposited closer to civilization – he wasn't certain Jack could survive for too long in the wilds.
"I shall admit, I did not expect to see a human child attempt to play a song on a bellossom's leaf," a new, deep and tired-sounding voice called. It was distinctly male and distinctly inhuman, and that definitely creeped Leo out. He jumped and whirled, his heart racing and finding himself thoroughly disappointed and confused to see the pink creature standing behind him, just outside the light of his fire.
"Uh," Leo said eloquently, staring at the slowking. He observed Leo with sharp, intelligent eyes and a small smile on his face, its hands held behind his back as he stood there regally. Shadows danced across its features, the pink gem in the middle of his crown reflecting the firelight in its smooth surface. The slowking's eyes held Leo's gaze, the expression on his face never faltering.
"Worry not, I am not here to cause you trouble," he said regally, the words coming out slowly and with a lot of forced enunciation. When Leo didn't respond, the slowking frowned, cocking his head to the side. "I am speaking the language of your people, yes? It has been so long since I have last spoke in this tongue, I am afraid I might be a little rusty."
"Uh, no, I mean yes, I can understand you, I'm just…surprised," Leo stammered out, trying to collect himself. The slowking smiled.
"I cannot say I am not surprised at that. It is not an everyday occurrence you meet a talking pokemon. May I sit? I do wish to converse with you for a time," he said. Leo nodded slowly, rubbing his forehead and sitting down on the opposite side of the fire from the slowking, the regal creature gingerly falling onto his backside with a groan. "Ah, I am getting too old," he muttered.
"Slooow," one of the slowpoke called, which Leo ignored in favor of staring at the slowking.
"Now first of all, I do have one question that must be answered – what is a child like you doing out in the woods like this?" the slowking asked. Leo frowned, but decided he was a little too tired to try to play any mind games. Besides, it was a slowking. What was the point of lying to a pokemon?
"No idea," Leo answered honestly. "I, quite literally, fell through the sky one day," at this, the slowking's eyes widened. Then they narrowed, and the pink creature sat forward, stubby hands resting on his knees.
"Explain," he demanded in all seriousness.
"Do you know of Lunala?" Leo asked. The slowking hummed and stroked its chin, closing his eyes for a moment.
"The embodiment of the moon, yes? That legendary being which is said to travel between dimensions – and makes its home originally in those islands to the far south, I believe," the slowking mused, nodding.
"Right, that one. Big old bat creature made of stars. Anyways, I originally…well, I can't quite remember what I was doing, but I was just living my life when all of a sudden I fall through a hole in space and time, land on a tropical island with my friend, the sky opens again and Lunala comes through before whisking me off to here – and dumping Jack, the friend I mentioned, god knows where." Leo summarized bluntly. This wasn't the story he would probably give to other humans, of course, but telling the slowking probably wouldn't cause any harm.
He might even have some insight into the situation that Leo hadn't thought of yet.
"I see," the slowking murmured. "That is quite the story you're telling,"
"The truth is stranger than fiction sometimes," Leo said with a shrug. "I mean, it's awfully strange that you can speak English, my native tongue. I didn't know English was a multi-universal language,"
"Maybe you're not speaking this…English, who is to say that you are not speaking our native tongue? Perhaps the legendary pokemon made this possible," the slowking remarked casually, waving one arm dismissively. Leo blinked, and the frowned, immediately wanting to dismiss the notion before realizing he had no way to disprove the slowking. Namely because the unown letters still looked like English letters to him, and who's to say his perception of language hadn't been changed? Lunala was part psychic type, right? So wasn't that plausible?
"Y'know, I wasn't actually wanting a rational answer," Leo grumbled, rubbing his already aching forehead.
"Apologies, it is a habit of mine to play the Giratina's advocate – especially when I am distracted." The slowking murmured. Leo huffed and shuffled back, moving to lean against a nearby tree. He was still cold, and it was still chilly, but his conversation with the slowking was definitely taking his mind off of things. "Unfortunately, this is beyond my ability to comprehend. Your situation is unique, so far as I have heard," the slowking said eventually, shaking his head and sighing.
"You…believe me?" Leo asked hesitantly. The slowking nodded, tapping its head with a smile.
"I am a psychic, dear child, I can read the base brainwaves of your mind to tell whether you are lying or not. And either you speak the truth, or have gone insane – though I doubt it is the latter," the slowking said. Leo blinked slowly, then nodded in understanding. It felt a little strange knowing that the slowking was essentially reading his mind, but he felt awfully calm about it. Maybe he was just desensitized to surprise by this point. "It also coincides with the rumors I have been hearing going around the forest. You have been travelling with the slowpoke herd for three and a half months –"
"How long?!" Leo interrupted, eyes flying wide open. He hadn't think that much time had passed! The slowking, however, forged ahead, uncaring of Leo's surprise as he explained his thoughts.
"Starting on the day of the spring equinox. I felt an awfully large surge of psychic activity that day – perhaps Lunala had something to do with it," he said, nodding. "Though I would not be surprised if other legendaries were involved besides the Living Moon. Perhaps the lords of space and time? T'would not be unreasonable for you to have disturbed their domains in your travel,"
"Huh," Leo said eloquently. The slowking shook his head and smiled at him.
"Though all of this is guesswork on my part. It will most likely be up to you to figure out your own situation," he said, and Leo nodded, disappointed. After a few moments of silence, during which time Leo added more wood to the fire and laid more out to dry, the slowking spoke again.
"I do believe this topic has brought us off-track. My true purpose in coming here was to meet the friend of the slowpokes," the slowking said, smiling. "It seems to me they have been in your care for a while now,"
"More like I've been in their care. Doubt I could have survived without them," Leo said honestly, huddling closer to the fire as the chill began to set in once more.
"Indeed," the slowking said somberly. "It is quite impressive you have survived this long, and even had the ability to survive against the weavile pack,"
Leo shuddered at the mention of the creatures. He'd seen a few of their tracks since the attack – having made sure to memorize their footprints so as to be better prepared – though hadn't actually seen any of the sneasel. That just meant the sneasel were still around, and he needed to be prepared.
"Less like survived and more like got saved by the slowpoke," Leo muttered, shaking his head. The slowking nodded, eyes roving over the sleeping forms of the slowpoke. "It feels a little weird, being so indebted to the slowpoke. Don't think I've ever really felt that way for…most anyone before, besides maybe my parents,"
"Slowpoke do not count debts," the slowking said sagely. Leo grunted but didn't reply, not doubting the slowking's words. The issue was, he couldn't think of a way to repay the slowpoke, besides maybe finding and king's rock or whatever to help King evolve. They wanted for nothing, really. Food was plentiful, and life was good for a slowpoke.
Leo's thoughts began to wander as silence reigned, unsure of what to ask and even if he needed to ask anything. True, he wanted to know the location of any civilization, but for some reason he couldn't get the words out. Like they had lodged themselves in his throat and refused to budge. His thoughts drifted to his home and family, who he would most likely never see again, barring another twist of fate.
His musing was broken by a wet head butting up against his back, followed by a low call from the slowpoke. Leo turned and smiled tiredly at who he recognized as King, the slowpoke ambling forward to lie down with a thump next to him, staring at the slowking unblinking.
"Hey King," Leo said with a smile, scratching King's ears. They flicked, droplets of water sent flying from the motion. "What are you doing up, huh"
"She is a good slowpoke," the slowking said, making Leo's eyebrows raise. Well, at least he knew King's gender now…though should he rename her Queen then, if it's a girl? The slowking leaned forward, meeting Leo's eyes intensely. "Though why do you call her King?"
"Oh, uh, because that's what she is?" Leo said with a frown, scratching his cheek and glancing down at the slowpoke beside him. "I mean, just look at what she does at night. King here always circles the herd, never bedding down until the last slowpoke has settled in – and at some point included me in that circle. Not to mention that she was the first to respond to the sneasel. If those aren't the actions of a leader, I don't know what are," he summarized with a shrug.
The slowking remained silent for a moment, then nodded his head. "I see. It would seem dear Archibald's journal did fall into the hands of a promising young human," he said, and Leo took a moment to process that information. "Allow me to answer your question before you pose it – yes, I was once Archibald's companion, as was the old tyranitar you have run into. Though he was old even before he joined the Team, and was the newest member. The rest of the team has faded with time, though a few of their descendants still remain in these mountains," slowking said.
"Huh," Leo said eloquently. "So…these slowpoke are all your kids then?" At this, the slowking laughed heartily, slapping his knee.
"Oh no, of course not! I have had no children in my time here – I am a King who lost his throne and his people thanks to a careless mistake. I am unfit to sire more children, save for those I left already on the shores of Cerulean," the slowking said sadly, and Leo blinked, gaining a sudden insight to the slowking. "In fact, I dare not call myself a king anymore. Archibald was our king, there could have been no other,"
"I see. I'm sorry," Leo said awkwardly.
"It is fine, many years have passed since that day. Though it seems you and I have much in common," the slowking explained with a dismissive wave of its hand…paw, thing. Leo wasn't sure what the stubby appendage was really called, because it looked like a hand but also a paw like a slowpoke's.
"How so?" Leo asked, shaking away his idle thoughts. He was far more tired than he thought if he was thinking about things like that.
"You and I both had our worlds stripped away by twists of fate," the slowking said simply, and Leo stilled. He looked at the slowking and, for a moment, felt just as he did. Tired, and old. Remembering a world and a life that could have continued on to greater heights, only to have it stripped away. The only difference was that Leo was given a new chance, another start, even if he hadn't wanted one.
"How did he die?" Leo asked, trusting the slowking would understand he was talking about Archibald. The slowking didn't reply immediately, opting to stand instead and yawn.
"I will tell you in the morning. There is must we must talk about, I believe. In the meantime, rest, it has been a long day and you are still injured from the hitmontop," he said. Leo barely registered the statement and how he knew Leo had fought a hitmontop as weariness suddenly washed over him like a wave, forcing his eyes to flutter shut. He wanted to voice more questions, but, as if some unseen force had struck him, instead he slumped over King and fell into a deep slumber, darkness taking him.
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